
Class^ 11 _ 

Book. 1 3 A 
GopigM?_J_ 

COPYRIGHT DEFOSIT. 



FATHER PAYNE 



t£ 



G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 

Gbe Umicfcerbocker press 
1916 






Copyright, 19 16 

BY 

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 



11916 






"Cbe Ifcnfcfcerbocfcer ipress, IRew Jt?orfe 

©CLA418372 






PREFACE 

OFTEN as I have thought of my old friend 
"Father Payne," as we affectionately called 
him, I had somehow never intended to write about 
him, or if I did, it was "like as a dream when one 
awaketh," a vision that melted away at the touch of 
common life. Yet I always felt that his was one of 
those rich personalities well worth depicting, if the 
attitude and gesture with which he faced the world 
could be caught and fixed. The difficulty was that 
he was a man of ideas rather than of performance, 
suggestive rather than active: and the whole history 
of his experiment with life was evasive, and even 
to ordinary views fantastic. 

Besides, my own life has been a busy one, full of 
hard ordinary work: it was not until the war gave 
me, like many craftsmen, a most reluctant and un- 
welcome space of leisure, that I ever had the oppor- 
tunity of considering the possibility of writing this 
book. I am too old to be a combatant, and too much 
of a specialist in literature to transmute my activities. 
I lately found myself with my professional occupa- 
tions suddenly suspended, and moreover, like many 
men who have followed a wholly peaceful profession, 
plunged in a dark bewilderment as to the onset of the 
forces governing the social life of Europe. In the 
sad inactivity which followed, I set to work to look 



iv Preface 

through my old papers, for the sake of distraction and 
employment, and found much material almost ready 
for use, careful notes of conversations, personal 
reminiscences, jottings of characteristic touches, 
which seemed as if they could be easily shaped. 
Moreover, the past suddenly revived, and became 
eloquent and vivid. I found in the beautiful memories 
of those glowing days that I spent with Father Payne 
— it was only three years — some consolation and 
encouragement in my distress. 

This little volume is the result. I am well aware 
that the busy years which have intervened have 
taken the edge off some of my recollections, while 
the lapse of time has possibly touched others with 
a sunset glow. That can hardly be avoided, and 
I am not sure that I wish to avoid it. 

I am not here concerned with either criticizing 
or endorsing Father Payne's views. I see both 
inconsistencies and fallacies in them. I even detect 
prejudices and misinterpretations of which I was 
not conscious at the time. I have no wish to idealize 
my subject unduly, but it is clear to me, and I hope 
I have made it clear to others, that Father Payne 
was a man who had a very definite theory of life and 
faith, and who at all events lived sincerely and even 
passionately in the light of his beliefs. Moreover, 
when he came to put them to the supreme test, the 
test of death, they did not desert or betray him: he 
passed on his way rejoicing. 

He used, I remember, to warn us against attempting 
too close an analysis of character. He used to say 
that the consciousness of a man, the intuitive instinct 
which impelled him, his attack upon experience, was a 
thing almost independent both of his circumstances 



Preface v 

and of liis reason. He used to take his parable from 
the weaving of a tapestry, and say that a box full of 
thread and a loom made up a very small part of the 
process. It was the inventive instinct of the crafts- 
man, the faculty of designing, that was all-important. 

He himself was a man of large designs, but he 
lacked perhaps the practical gift of embodiment. 
I looked upon him as a man of high poetical powers, 
with a great range of hopes and visions, but without 
the technical accomplishment which lends these 
their final coherence. He was fully aware of this 
himself, but he neither regretted it nor disguised 
it. The truth was that his interest in existence 
was so intense, that he lacked the power of self- 
limitation needed for an artistic success. What, 
however, he gave to alf who came in touch with him, 
was a strong sense of the richness and greatness of 
life and all its issues. He taught us to approach 
it with no preconceived theories, no fears, no pre- 
ferences. He had a great mistrust of conventional 
interpretation and traditional explanations. At the 
same time he abhorred controversy and wrangling. 
He had no wish to expunge the ideals of others, so 
long as they were sincerely formed rather than meekly 
received. Though I have come myself to somewhat 
different conclusions, he at least taught me to draw 
my own inferences from my own experiences, without 
either deferring to or despising the conclusions of 
others. 

The charm of his personality lay in his independence, 
his sympathy, his eager freshness of view, his purity 
of motive, his perfect simplicity; and it is all this 
which I have attempted to depict, rather than to 
trace his theories, or to present a philosophy which 



vi Preface 

was always concrete rather than abstract, and passion- 
ate rather than deliberate. To use a homely proverb, 
Father Payne was a man who filled his chair! 

Of one thing I feel sure, and that is that wherever 
Father Payne is, and whatever he may be doing — 
for I have as absolute a conviction of the continued 
existence of his fine spirit as I have of the present 
existence of my own — he will value my attempt to 
depict him as he was. I remember his telling me a 
story of Dr. Johnson, how in the course of his last 
illness, when he could not open his letters, he asked 
Boswell to read them for him. Bos well opened a 
letter from some person in the North of England, of a 
complimentary kind, and thinking it would fatigue 
Dr. Johnson to have it read aloud, merely observed 
that it was highly in his piaise. Dr. Johnson at once 
desired it to be read to him, and said with great 
earnestness, "The applause of a single human being 
is of great consequence." Father. Payne added that 
it was one of Johnson's finest sayings, and had no 
touch of vanity or self-satisfaction in it, but the vital 
stuff of humanity. That I believe to be profoundly 
true : and that is the spirit in which I have set all this 
down. 

September 30, 1915. 



CONTENTS 









PAGE 


I. — FATHER PAYNE . . I 


II. — AVELEY 






6 


III. — THE SOCIETY . 






■ 17 


IV. — THE SUMMONS 






23 


V. — THE SYSTEM . 






27 


VI. — FATHER PAYNE 






33 


VII. THE MEN 






38 


VIII. — THE METHOD 






45 


IX. — FATHER PAYNE 






52 


X. — CHARACTERISTICS . 






61 


XI. — CONVERSATION 






67 


XII. — OF GOING TO CHURCH 






70 


XIII. — OF NEWSPAPERS 






77 


XIV. — OF HATE 






82 


XV. OF WRITING . 






89 


XVI. OF MARRIAGE 






94 


XVII. — OF LOVING GOD 






99 


XVIII. — OF FRIENDSHIP 






103 


XIX. OF PHYLLIS . 






in 


XX. OF CERTAINTY 






119 


XXI. OF BEAUTY . 






123 


XXII. — OF WAR 






128 


vii 









Vlll 



Contents 



XXIII.-^-OF CADS AND PHARISEES 
XXIV. — OF CONTINUANCE . 

XXV. OF PHILANTHROPY . 

XXVI. OF FEAR 

XXVII. — OF ARISTOCRACY 

XXVIII. OF CRYSTALS 

XXIX. EARLY LIFE . 

XXX. OF BLOODSUCKERS 

XXXI. OF INSTINCTS 

XXXII. OF HUMILITY 

XXXIII. OF MEEKNESS 

XXXIV. — OF CRITICISM 
XXXV. — OF THE SENSE OF BEAUTY 

XXXVI. OF BIOGRAPHY 

XXXVII. OF POSSESSIONS 

XXXVIII. OF LONELINESS 

XXXIX. OF THE WRITER'S LIFE 

XL. — OF WASTE 
XLI. — OF EDUCATION 
XLII. — OF RELIGION 

XLIII. OF CRITICS . 

XLIV.— OF WORSHIP . 
XLV. — OF A CHANGE OF RELIGION 

XL VI. OF AFFECTION 

XLVII. OF RESPECT OF PERSONS 

XLVIII. OF AMBIGUITY 

XLIX. OF BELIEF 

L. OF HONOUR . 



Contents 



IX 



LI. — OF WORK 
LII. — OF COMPANIONSHIP 

LIII. OF MONEY 

LIV. OF PEACEABLENESS 

LV. — OF LIFE-FORCE 
LVI. — OF CONSCIENCE 
LVII. — OF RANK 
LVIII. — OF BIOGRAPHY 
LIX. — OF EXCLUSIVENESS 
LX. — OF TAKING LIFE 
LXI. — OF BOOKISHNESS 
LXII. — OF CONSISTENCY 
LXIII. — OF WRENS AND LILIES 

LXIV. OF POSE 

LXV. — OF REVENANTS 

LXVI. OF DISCIPLINE 

LXVII. — OF INCREASE 
LXVIII. — OF PRAYER . 

LXIX. THE SHADOW 

LXX. OF WEAKNESS 

LXXI. — THE BANK OF THE RIVER 
LXXII. — THE CROSSING 
LXXIII. — AFTER-THOUGHTS . 
LXXIV. — DEPARTURE . 



FATHER PAYNE 



FATHER PAYNE 

IT was a good many years ago, soon after I left 
Oxford, when I was twenty-three years old, that 
all this happened. I had taken a degree in Classics, 
and I had not given much thought to my future 
profession. There was no very obvious opening 
for me, no family business, no influence in any par- 
ticular direction. My father had been in the Army, 
but was long dead. My mother and only sister lived 
quietly in the country. I had no prosaic and practical 
uncles to push me into any particular line; while on 
coming of age I had inherited a little capital which 
brought me in some two hundred a year, so that I 
could afford to wait and look round. My only real 
taste was for literature. I wanted to write, but I had 
no very pressing aspirations or inspirations. I may 
confess that I was indolent, fond of company, but not 
afraid of comparative solitude, and I was moreover an 
entire dilettante. I read a good many books, and 
tried feverishly to write in the style of the authors who 
most attracted me. I settled down at home, more 
or less, in a country village where I knew everyone; 
I travelled a little; and I paid occasional visits to 
i 



2 Father Payne 

London, where several of my undergraduate and 
school friends lived, with a vague idea of getting to 
know literary people; but they were not very easy to 
meet, and, when I did meet them, they did not betray 
any very marked interest in my designs and visions. 

I was dining one night at a restaurant with a 
college friend of mine, Jack Vincent, whose tastes were 
much the same as my own, only more strenuous; his 
father and mother lived in London, and when I went 
there I generally stayed with them. They were well- 
to-do, good-natured people; but, beyond occasionally 
reminding Jack that he ought to be thinking about a 
profession, they left him very much to his own devices, 
and he had begun to write a novel, and a play, and 
two or three other masterpieces. 

That particular night his father and mother were 
dining out, so we determined to go to a restaurant. 
And it was there that Vincent told me about "Father" 
Payne, as he was called by his friends, though he was a 
layman and an Anglican. He had heard all about him 
from an Oxford man, Leonard Barthrop, some years 
older than ourselves, who was one of the circle of men 
whom Father Payne had collected about him. Vin- 
cent was very full of the subject. He said that 
Father Payne was an elderly man, who had been for 
a good many years a rather unsuccessful teacher in 
London, and that he had unexpectedly inherited a 
little country estate in Northamptonshire. He had 
gradually gathered about him a small knot of men, 
mainly interested in literature, who were lodged and 
boarded free, and were a sort of informal community, 
bound by no very strict regulations, except that they 
were pledged to produce a certain amount of work at 
stated intervals for Father Payne's inspection. As 



Father Payne 3 

long as they did this, they were allowed to work very 
much as they liked, and Father Payne was always 
ready to give criticism and advice. Father Payne 
reserved the right of dismissing them if they were idle, 
quarrelsome, or troublesome in any way, and exercised 
it decisively. But Barthrop had told him that it was 
a most delightful life; that Father Payne was a very 
interesting, good-natured, and amusing man ; and that 
the whole thing was both pleasant and stimulating. 
There were certain rules about work and hours, and 
members of the circle were not allowed to absent them- 
selves without leave, while Father Payne sometimes 
sent them off for a time, if he thought they required 
a change. "I gather," said Vincent, "that he is an 
absolute autocrat, and that you have to do what he 
tells you; but that he doesn't preach, and he doesn't 
fuss. Barthrop says he has never been so happy in 
his life. " He went on to say that there were at least 
two vacancies in the circle — one of the number had 
lately married, and another had accepted a journalistic 
post. "Now what do you say," said Vincent, "to 
us two trying to go there for a bit? You can try it, 
I believe, without pledging yourself, for two or three 
months; and then if Father Payne approves, and you 
want to go on, you can regularly join. " 

I confess that it seemed to me a very attractive 
affair, and all that Vincent told me of the place, and 
particularly of Father Payne, attracted me. Vincent 
said that he had mentioned me to Barthrop, and that 
Barthrop had said that I might have a chance of get- 
ting in. It appeared that we should have to go down 
to the place to be interviewed. 

We made up our minds to apply, and that night 
Vincent wrote to Barthrop. The answer was favour- 



4 Father Payne 

able. Two days later Vincent received a note from 
Father Payne, written in a big, finely formed hand, 
to the effect that he would be glad to see Vincent any 
night that he could come down, and that I might also 
arrange an interview, if I wished, but that we were to 
come separately. "Mind," said the letter, "I can 
make no promises and can give no reasons; but I will 
not keep either of you waiting. " 

Vincent went first. He spent a night at Aveley 
Hall, as the place was called. I continued my visit 
to his people, and awaited his return with great 
interest. 

He told me what had happened. He had been 
met at the station by an odd little trap, had driven 
up to the house — a biggish place, close to a small 
church, on the outskirts of a tiny village. It was 
dark when he arrived, and he had found Father 
Payne at tea with four or five men, in a flagged hall. 
There had been a good deal of talk and laughter. 
" He is a big man, Father Payne, with a beard, dressed 
rather badly, like a country squire, very good-natured 
and talkative. Everyone seemed to say pretty 
much what they liked, but he kept them in order, too. 
I could see that ! " Then he had been carried off to a 
little study and questioned. "He simply turned me 
inside out," said Vincent, and I told him all my bio- 
graphy and everything I had ever done and thought 
of. He didn't seem to look at me much, but I felt 
he. was overhauling me somehow. Then I went and 
read in a sort of library, and then we had dinner — just 
the same business. Then the men mostly disappeared, 
and Barthrop carried me off for a talk, and told me a 
lot about everything. Then I went to my room, a 
big, ugly, comfortable bedroom; and in the morning 



Father Payne 



there was breakfast, where people dropped in, read 
papers or letters, did not talk, and went off when they 
had done. Then I walked about in a nice, rather wild 
garden. There seemed a lot of fields and trees beyond, 
all belonging to the house, but no park, and only a 
small stable, with a kitchen-garden. There were very 
few servants that I saw — an old butler and some 
elderly maids — and then I came away. Father Payne 
just came out and shook hands, and said he would 
write to me. It seemed exactly the sort of thing I 
should like. I only hope we shall both get in. " 

It certainly sounded attractive, and it was with 
great curiosity that I went off on the following day, 
as appointed, for my own interview. 



II 



THE train drew up at a little wayside station soon 
after four o'clock on a November afternoon. It 
was a bare, but rather an attractive landscape. The 
line ran along a wide, shallow valley, with a stream 
running at the bottom, with many willows, and pools 
fringed with withered sedges. The fields were mostly 
pastures, with here and there a fallow. There were a 
good many bits of woodland all about, and a tall spire 
of pale stone, far to the south, overtopped the roofs of 
a little town. I was met by an old groom or coach- 
man, with a little ancient open cart, and we drove 
sedately along pleasant lanes, among woods, till we 
entered a tiny village, which he told me was Aveley, 
consisting of three or four farmhouses, with barns 
and ricks, and some rows of stone-built cottages. We 
turned out of the village in the direction of a small and 
plain church of some antiquity, behind which I saw 
a grove of trees and the chimneys of a house sur- 
mounted by a small cupola. The house stood close 
by the church, having an open space of grass in front, 
with an old sun-dial, and a low wall separating it from 
the churchyard. We drove in at a big gate, standing 
open, with stone gate-posts. The Hall was a long 
stone-built Georgian house, perhaps a hundred and 
fifty years old, with two shallow wings and a stone- 
6 



Aveley 7 

tiled roof, and was obviously of considerable size. 
Some withered creepers straggled over it, and it was 
neatly kept, but with no sort of smartness. The 
trees grew rather thickly to the east of the house, 
and I could see to the right a stable-yard, and beyond 
that the trees of the garden. We drew up — it was 
getting dark — and an old manservant with a paternal 
air came out, took possession of my bag, and led me 
through a small vestibule into a long hall, with a fire 
burning in a great open fireplace. There was a gallery 
at one end, with a big organ in it. The hall was paved 
with black and white stone, and there were some com- 
fortable chairs, a cabinet or two, and some dim paint- 
ings on the walls. Tea was spread at a small table 
by the fire, and four or five men, two of them quite 
young, the others rather older, were sitting about on 
chairs and sofas, or helping themselves to tea at the 
table. On the hearth, with his back to the fire, stood 
a great, burly man with a short, grizzled beard and 
tumbled grey hair, rather bald, dressed in a rough 
suit of light-brown homespun, with huge shooting 
boots, whom I saw at once to be my host. The 
talk stopped as I entered, and I was aware that I was 
being scrutinized with some curiosity. Father Payne 
did not move, but extended a hand, which I advanced 
and shook, and said: "Very glad to see you, Mr. 
Duncan — you are just in time for tea." He mentioned 
the names of the men present, who came and shook 
hands very cordially. Barthrop gave me some tea, 
and I was inducted into a chair by the fire. I thought 
for a moment that I was taking Father Payne's place, 
and feebly murmured something about taking his 
chair. "They're all mine, thanks!" he said with a 
smile, "but I claim no privileges." Someone gave a 



8 Father Payne 

faint whistle at this, and Father Payne, turning his 
eyes but not his head towards the young man who had 
uttered the sound, said: "All right, Pollard, if you 
are going to be mutinous, we shall have a little business 
to transact together, as Mr. Squeers said. " " Oh, I'm 
not mutinous, sir," said the young man — "I'm quite 
submissive — I was just betrayed into it by amaze- 
ment!" "You shouldn't get into the habit of thinking 
aloud," said Father Payne; "at least not among bache- 
lors — when you are married you can do as you like ! — ■ 
I hope you are polite?" he went on, looking round 
at me. "I think so," I said, feeling rather shy. 
"That's right," he said. "It's the first and only form 
of virtue! If you are only polite, there is nothing 
that you may not do. This is a school of manners, 
you know ! " One of the men, Rose by name, laughed 
— a pleasant musical laugh. " I remember, " he said, 
"that when I was a boy at Eton, my excellent but 
very bluff and rough old tutor called upon. us, and was 
so much taken up with being hearty, that he knocked 
over the coal-scuttle, and didn't let anyone get a word 
in; and when he went off in a sort of whirlwind, my 
old aunt, who was an incisive lady, said in a meditative 
tone : ' How strange it is that the only thing that the 
Eton masters seem able to teach their boys is the only 
thing they don't themselves possess!'" 

Father Payne uttered a short, loud laugh at this, and 
said: "Is there any chance of meeting your aunt?" 
" No, sir, she is long since dead ! " "Blew off too much 
steam, perhaps," said Father Payne. "That woman 
must have had the steam up! I should like to 
have known her — a remarkable woman! Have you 
any more stories of the same sort about her? " 

"Not to-day," said Rose, smiling. 



Aveley 9 

"Quite right," said Father Payne. "You keep 
them for an acceptable time. Never tell strings of 
stories — and, by the way, my young friends, that's 
the art of writing. Don't cram in good things — ■ 
space them out, Barthrop!" 

"I think I can spread the butter as thin as anyone, " 
said Barthrop, smiling. 

"So you can, so you can!" said Father Payne 
enthusiastically, "and very thin slices too! I give 
you full credit for that ! ' ' 

The men had begun to drift away, and I was pre- 
sently left alone with Father Payne. "Now you come 
along of me!" he said to me; and when I got up, he 
took my arm in a pleasant fashion, led me to a big 
curtained archway at the far end of the hall, under the 
gallery, and along a flagged passage to the right. As 
we went he pointed to the doors — ' ' Smoking-room — 
Library" — and at the end of the passage he opened a 
door, and led me into a small panelled room with a 
big window, closely curtained. It was a solid and 
stately place, wholly bare of ornament. It had a 
writing-table, a bookcase, two arm-chairs of leather, 
a fine fireplace with marble pillars, and an old painting 
let into the panelling above it. There was a bright, 
unshaded lamp on the table. "This is my room," 
he said, "and there's nothing in it that I don't use, 
except those pillars; and when I haul on them, like 
Samson, the house comes down. Now you sit down 
there, and we'll have a talk. Do you mind the light? 
No? Well, that's all right, as I want to have a good 
look at you, you know! You can get a smoke after- 
wards — this is business!" 

He sate down in the chair opposite me, and stirred 
the fire. He had fine, large, solid hands, the softness 



io Father Payne 

of which, like silk, had struck me when I shook hands 
with him; and, though he was both elderly and bulky, 
he moved with a certain grace and alertness. "Tell 
me your tale from the beginning," he said. "Don't 
leave out any details — I like details. Let's have your 
life and death and Christian sufferings, as the tracts 
say." 

He heard me with much patience, sometimes 
smiling, sometimes nodding. When I had finished 
he said: "Now I must ask you a few questions — you 
don't mind if they are plain questions — rather un- 
pleasant questions ? " He bent his brows upon me and 
smiled. "No," I said, "not at all." "Well, then," 
he said, ' ' where's the vocation in all this ? This place, 
to be brief, is for men who have a real vocation for 
writing, and yet never would otherwise have the time 
or the leisure to train for it. You see, in England, 
people think that you needn't train for writing — that 
you have just got to begin, and there you are. Very 
few people have the money to wait a few years — they 
have to write, not what they want to write, but what 
other people want to read. And so it comes about 
that by the time that they have earned the money and 
the leisure, the spring is gone, the freshness is gone, 
there's no invention and no zest. Writing can't be 
done in a little corner of life. You have to give up 
your life to it — and then that means giving up your 
life to a great deal of what looks like pure lazi- 
ness — loafing about, looking about, travelling, talking, 
mooning; that is the only way to learn proportion; 
and it is the only way, too, of learning what not to 
write about — a great many things that are written 
about are not really material for writing at all. And 
all this can't be done in a drivelling mood — you must 



Aveley n 

pick your way if you are going to write. That's a 
long preface; but I mean this place to be a place to 
give men the right sort of start. I happen to be able 
to teach people, more or less, how to write, if they have 
got the stuff in them — and to be frank, I'm not sure 
that you have! You think this would be a pleasant 
sort of experience — so it can be; but it isn't done on 
slack and chattering lines. It is just meant to save 
people from hanging about at the start, a thing which 
spoils a lot of good writers. But it's deadly serious, 
and it isn't a dilettante life at all. Do you grasp all 
that?" 

"Yes," I said, "and I believe I can work! I know 
I have wasted my time, but it was not because I 
wanted to waste time, but because the sort of things 
I have always had to do — the classics — always seemed 
to me so absolutely pointless. No one who taught 
me ever distinguished between what was good and 
what was bad. Whatever it was — a Greek play, 
Homer, Livy, Tacitus — it was always supposed to be 
the best thing of the kind. I was always sure that 
much of it was rot, and some of it was excellent; but 
I didn't know why, and no one ever told me why. " 

"You thought all that?" said he. "Well, that's 
more hopeful ! Have you ever done any essay work? " 

"Yes," I said, "and that was the worst of all — no 
one ever showed me how to do it in my own way, 
but always in someone else's way. " 

He sate a little in silence. Then he said: "But 
mind you, that's not all! I don't think writing is the 
end of life. The real point is to feel the things, to 
understand the business, to have ideas about life. I 
don't want people to learn how to write interestingly 
about things in which they are not interested — but to 



12 Father Payne 

be interested first, and then to write if they can. I 
like to turn out a good writer, who can say what he 
feels and believes. But I'm just as pleased when a 
man tells me that writing is rubbish, and that he is 
going away to do something real. The real — that's 
what I care about! I don't want men to come and 
pick up grains of truth and reality, and work them 
into their stuff. I have turned out a few men like 
that, and those are my worst failures. You have got 
to care about ideas, if you come here, and to get the 
ideas into shape. You have got to learn what is beau- 
tiful and what is not, because the only business of a 
real writer is with beauty — not a sickly exotic sort of 
beauty, but the beauty of health and strength and 
generous feeling. I can't have any humbugs here, 
though I have sent out some humbugs. It's a hard 
life this, and a tiring life; though if you are the right 
sort of fellow, you will get plenty of fun out of it. But 
we don't waste time here; and if a man wastes time, 
out he goes." 

"I believe I can work as hard as anyone," I said, 
"though I have shown no signs of it — and anyhow, I 
should like to try. And I do really want to learn how 
to distinguish between things, how to know what 
matters. No one has ever shown me how to do that! " 

"That's all right!" he said. "But are you sure 
you don't want simply to make a bit of a name — to 
be known as a clever man? It's very convenient, you 
know, in England, to have a label. Because I want 
you clearly to understand that this place of mine has 
nothing whatever to do with that. I take no stock 
in what is called success. This is a sort of monastery, 
you know; and the worst of some monasteries is that 
they cultivate dreams. That's a beautiful thing in its 



Aveley 13 



way, but it isn't what I aim at. I don't want men to 
drug themselves with dreams. The great dreamers 
don't do that. Shelley, for instance — his dreams were 
all made out of real feeling, real beauty. He wanted to 
put things right in his own way. He was enraged with 
life because he was fine, while Byron was enraged with 
life because he was vulgar. Vulgarity — that's the 
one fatal complaint; it goes down deep to the bottom 
of the mind. And I may as well say plainly that that 
is what I fight against here." 

"I don't honestly think I am vulgar," I said. 

"Not on the surface, perhaps," he said, "but 
present-day education is a snare. We are a vulgar 
nation, you know. That is what is really the matter 
with us — our ambitions are vulgar, our pride is vulgar. 
We want to fit into the world and get the most we can 
out of it; we don't, most of us, just want to give it our 
best. That's what I mean by vulgarity, wanting to 
take and not wanting to give. " 

He was silent for a minute, and then he said: "Do 
you believe in God?" 

"T hardly know," I said. "Not very much, I am 
afraid, in the kind of God that I have heard preached 
about." 

"What do you mean?" he said. 

"Well," I said, "it's rather a large question — but 
I used to think, both at school and at Oxford, that 
many of the men who were rather disapproved of, 
that did quite bad things, and tried experiments, and 
knocked up against nastiness of various kinds, but 
who were brave in their way and kind, and not mean 
or spiteful or fault-finding, were more the sort of people 
that the force — or whatever it is, behind the world — 
was trying to produce than many of the virtuous 



14 Father Payne 

people. What was called virtue and piety had some- 
thing stifling and choking about it, I used to think. 
I had a tutor at school who was a parson, and he was a 
good sort of man, too, in a way. But I used to feel 
suddenly dreary with him, as if there were a whole lot 
of real things and interesting things which he was 
afraid of. I couldn't say what I thought to him — 
only what I felt he wanted me to think. That's 
a bad answer," I went on, "but I haven't really 
considered it. " 

"No, it isn't a bad answer," he said. "It's all 
right! The moment you feel stifled with anyone, 
whatever the subject is — art, books, religion, life — 
there is something wrong. Do you say any prayers ? " 

" No, " I said, " to be honest, I don't. " 

"You must take to it again," he said. "You 
can't get on without prayer. And if you come here, " 
he said, "you may expect to hear about God. I talk 
a good deal about God. I don't believe in things 
being too sacred to talk about — it's the bad things that 
ought not to be mentioned. I am interested in God 
more than I am interested in anything else. I can't 
make Him out — and yet I believe that He needs me, in 
a way, as much as I need Him. Does that sound 
profane to you?" 

"No, " I said, "it's new to me. No one ever spoke 
about God to me like that before." 

"We have to suffer with Him!" he said in a curious 
tone, his face lighting up. "That is the point of 
Christianity, that God suffers, because He wants to 
remake the world, and cannot do it all at once. That 
is the secret of all life and hope, that if we believe in 
God, we must suffer with Him. It's a fight, a hard 
fight; and He needs us on His side. But I won't talk 



Aveley 15 

about that now; yet if you don't want to believe in 
God, and to be friends with Him, and to fight and 
surfer with Him, you needn't think of coming here. 
That's behind all I do. And to come here is simply 
that you may find out where He needs you. Why 
writing is important is, because the world needs freer 
and plainer talk about God — about beauty and health 
and happiness and energy, and all the things which 
He stands for. Half the evil comes from silence, and 
the end of all my experiments is the word in the New 
Testament, Ephphatha — Be opened! That is what 
I try for, to give men the power of opening their hearts 
and minds to others, without fear and yet without 
offence. I don't want men to attack things or to 
criticize things, but just to speak plainly about what 
is beautiful and wholesome and true. So you see this 
isn't a place for lazy and fanciful people — not a fort- 
ress of quiet, and still less a place for asses to slake 
their thirst! We don't set out to amuse ourselves, 
but to perceive things, and to say them if we can. 
My men must be sound and serious, and they must be 
civil and amusing too. They have got to learn how 
to get on with each other, and with me, and with the 
village people — and with God! If you want just to 
dangle about, this isn't the place for you; but if you 
want to work hard and be knocked into shape, I'll 
consider it." 

There was something tremendous about Father 
Payne! I looked at him with a sense of terror. His 
face dissolved in a smile. "You needn't look at me 
like that !" he said. "I only want you to know exactly 
what you are in for!" 

"I would like to try," I said. 

"Well, we'll see!" he said. "And now you must 



1 6 Father Payne 

be off!" he added. "We shall dine in an hour — you 
needn't dress. Here, you don't know which your 
room is, I suppose?" 

He rang the bell, and I went off with the old butler, 
who was amiable and communicative. "So, you think 
of becoming one of the gentlemen, sir?" he said. 
"If you'll have me," I replied. "Oh, that will be all 
right, sir, ' ' he said. ' ' I could see that the Father took 
to you at first sight!" 

He showed me my room — a big bare place. It had 
a small bed and accessories, but it was also fitted as 
a sitting-room, with a writing-table, an arm-chair, 
and a bookcase full of books. The house was warmed, 
I saw, with hot water to a comfortable temperature. 
"Would you like a fire?" he said. I declined, and he 
went on: " Now if you lived here, sir, you would have 
to do that yourself ! " He gave a little laugh. ' ' Any- 
one may have a fire, but they have to lay it, and fetch 
the coal, and clean the grate. Very few of the gentle- 
men do it. Anything else, sir? I have put out your 
things, and you will find hot water laid on. " 

He left me, and I flung myself into the chair. I 
had a good deal to think about. 



Ill 

THE SOCIETY 

AVERY quiet evening followed. A bell rang out 
above the roof at 8.15. I went down to the 
hall, where the men assembled. Father Payne came 
in. He had changed his clothes, and was wearing 
a dark, loose-fitting suit, which became him well — 
he always looked at home in his clothes. The others 
wore similar suits or smoking-jackets. Father Payne 
appeared abstracted, and only gave me a nod. A gong 
sounded, and he marched straight out through a door 
by the fireplace into the dining-room. 

The dining-room was a rather grand place, panelled 
in dark wood, and with a few portraits. At each end 
of the room was a section cut off from the central 
portion by an oak column on each side. Three win- 
dows on one side looked into the garden. It was 
lighted by candles only. We were seven in all, and 
I sate by Father Payne. Dinner was very plain. 
There was soup, a joint with vegetables, and a great 
apple-tart. The things were mostly passed about 
from hand to hand, but the old butler kept a benignant 
eye upon the proceedings, and saw that I was well 
supplied. There was a good and simple claret in 
large flat-bottomed decanters, which most of the men 
drank. There was a good deal of talk of a lively 
kind. Father Payne was rather silent, though he 
2 i7 



1 8 Father Payne 

struck in now and then, but his silence imposed no 
constraint on the party. He was pressed to tell a 
story for my benefit, which he did with much relish, 
but briefly. I was pleased at the simplicity of it all. 
There was only one man who seemed a little out of 
tune — a clerical-looking, handsome fellow of about 
thirty, called Lestrange, with an air of some solemnity. 
He made remarks of rather an earnest type, and was 
ironically assailed once or twice. Father Payne 
intervened once, and said: "Lestrange is perfectly 
right, and you would think so too, if only he could give 
what he said a more secular twist. 'Be soople in 
things immaterial,' Lestrange, as the minister says in 
Kidnapped.'" "But who is to judge if it is imma- 
terial?" said Lestrange rather pertinaciously. "It 
mostly is," said Father Payne. "Anything is better 
than being shocked! It's better to be ashamed after- 
wards of not speaking up than to feel you have made 
a circle uncomfortable. You must not rebuke people 
unless you really hate doing it. If you like doing it, 
you may be pretty sure that it is vanity; a Christian 
ought not to feel out of place in a smoking-room! " 

The whole thing did not take more than three 
quarters of an hour. Coffee was brought in, very 
strong and good. Some of the party went off, and 
Father Payne disappeared. I went to the smoking- 
room with two of the men, and we talked a little. 
Finally I went away to my room, and tried to commit 
my impressions of the whole thing to my diary before 
I went to bed. It certainly seemed a happy life, and 
I was struck with the curious mixture of freedom, 
frankness, and yet courtesy about the whole. There 
was no roughness or wrangling or stupidity, nor had 
I any sense either of exclusion, or of being elaborately 



The Society 19 

included in the life of the circle. I would call the 
atmosphere brotherly, if brotherliness did not often 
mean the sort of frankness which is so unpleasant to 
strangers. There certainly was an atmosphere about 
it, and I felt too that Father Payne, for all his easiness 
had somehow got the reins in his hands. 

The next morning I went down to breakfast, which 
was, I found, like breakfast at a club, as Vincent had 
said. It was a plain meal — cold bacon, a vast dish of 
scrambled eggs kept hot by a spirit lamp and a hot- 
water arrangement. You could make toast for your- 
self if you wished, and there was a big fresh loaf, with 
excellent butter, marmalade, and jam — not an ascetic 
breakfast at all. There were daily papers on the 
table, and no one talked. I did not see Father Payne, 
who must have come in later. 

After breakfast, Barthrop showed me the rooms of 
the house. The library was fitted up with bookshelves 
and easy-chairs for reading, with a big round oak 
table in the centre. The floor was of stained oak 
boards and covered with rugs. There was also a 
capacious smoking-room, and I learned that smoking 
was not allowed elsewhere. It was, in fact, a solid 
old family mansion of some dignity. There were three 
or four oil paintings in all the rooms, portraits and 
landscapes. The general tone of decoration was dark 
■ — red wall-papers and fittings stained brown. It was 
all clean and simple, and there was a total absence of 
ornament. I went and walked in the garden, which 
was of the same very straightforward kind — plain 
grass, shrubberies, winding paths, with comfortable 
wooden seats in sheltered places; one or two big beds, 
evidently of old-fashioned perennials, and some trellises 
for ramblers. The garden was adjoined by a sort of 



20 Father Payne 

wilderness, with big trees and ground-ivy, and open 
spaces in which aconites and snowdrops were beginning 
to show themselves. Father Payne, I gathered, was 
fond of the garden and often worked there; but there 
were no curiosities — it was all very simple. Beyond 
that were pasture-fields, with a good many clumps and 
hedgerow trees, running down to a stream, which had 
been enlarged into a deep pool at one place, where 
there was a timbered bathing-shed. The stream fed, 
through little sluices, a big, square pond, full, I was 
told, in summer of bulrushes and water-lilies. I 
noticed a couple of lawn-tennis courts, and there was a 
bowling-green by the house. Then there was a large 
kitchen-garden, with standards and espaliers, and 
box-edged beds. The stables, which were spacious, 
contained only a pony and the little cart I had driven 
up in, and a few bicycles. I liked the solid air of the 
big house, which had two wings at the back, corre- 
sponding to the wings in front; the long row of stone 
pedimented windows, with heavy white casements, 
was plain and stately, and there were some fine mag- 
nolias and wisterias trained upon the walls. It all 
looked stately, and yet homelike; there was nothing 
neglected about it, and yet it looked wholesomely 
left alone; everything was neat, but nothing was 
smart. 

I was strolling about, enjoying the gleams of bright 
sunshine and the cold air, when I saw Father Payne 
coming down the garden towards me. He gave me a 
pleasant nod; I said something about the beauty of 
the place; he smiled, and said: "Yes, it is the kind of 
thing I like — but I am so used to it that I can hardly 
even see it! That's the worst of habit; but there is 
nothing about the place to get on your nerves. It's 



The Society 21 

a well-bred old house, I think, and knows how to hold 
its tongue, without making you uncomfortable." 
Then he went on presently: "You know how I came 
by it? It's an odd story. It had been in my family, 
till my grandfather left it to his second wife, and cut 
my father out. There was a son by the second wife 
who was meant to have it; but he died, and it went to 
a brother of the second wife, and his widow left it back 
to me. It was an entire surprise, because I did not 
know her, and the only time I had ever seen the house 
was once when I came down on the sly, just to look 
at the old place, little thinking I should ever come here. 
She had some superstition about it, I fancy! Any- 
how, while I was grubbing away in town, fifteen years 
ago, and hardly able to make two ends meet, I sud- 
denly found myself put in possession of it ; and though 
I am poor, as squires go, the farms and cottages bring 
me in quite enough to rub along. At any rate it 
enabled me to try some experiments, and I have been 
doing so ever since. Leisure and solitude! Those 
are the only two things worth having that money can 
buy. Perhaps you don't think there's much solitude 
about our life? But solitude only means the power to 
think your own thoughts, without having other peo- 
ple's thoughts trailed across the track. Loneliness is 
quite a different thing, and that's not wholesome." 

He strolled on, looking about him. "Do you 
ever garden?" he said. "It's the best fun in the 
world — making plants do as you like, while all the 
time they think they are doing as they like. That's 
the secret of it ! You can't bully these wild things, but 
they are very obedient, as long as they believe they 
are free. They are like children; they will take any 
amount of trouble as long as you don't call it work. " 



22 Father Payne 

Presently we heard the clatter of hoofs in the stable- 
yard. "That's for you!" he said. " Will you go and 
see that they have brought your things down? I'll 
meet you at the door." I went up and found my 
things had been packed by the old butler. I gave him 
a little tip, and he said confidentially: "I daresay we 
shall be seeing you back here, sir, one of these days." 
"I hope so," I said, to which he replied with a 
mysterious wink and nod. 

Father Payne shook hands. "Well, good-bye!" 
he said. "It's good of you to have come down, and 
I'm glad to have made acquaintance, whatever hap- 
pens — I'll drop you a line." I drove away, and he 
stood at the door looking after me, till the little cart 
drove out of the gate. 



IV 

THE SUMMONS 

I MUST confess that I was much excited about my 
visit; the whole thing seemed to me to be almost 
too good to be true, and I hardly dared hope that 
I should be allowed to return. I went back to town 
and rejoined Vincent, and we talked much about the 
delights of Aveley. 

The following morning we each received a letter 
in Father Payne's firm hand. That to Vincent was 
very short. It ran as follows: 

Dear Vincent, — I shall be glad to take you in if 
you wish to join us, for three months. At the end of 
that time, we shall both be entirely free to choose. I 
hope you will be happy here. You can come as soon 
as you like; and if Duncan, after reading my letter, 
decides to come too, you had better arrange to arrive 
together. It will save me the trouble of describing our 
way of life to each separately. Please let me have a 
line, and I will see that your room is ready for you. 
Sincerely yours, 

C. Payne. 

"That's all right!" said Vincent, with an air of 
relief. " Now what does he say to you?" 
My letter was a longer one. It ran: 
23 



24 Father Payne 

My dear Young Man, — I am going to be very 
frank with you, and to say that, though I like you very 
much, I nearly decided that I could not ask you to join 
us. I will tell you why. I am not sure that you are 
not too easy-going and impulsive. We should all find 
you agreeable, and I am sure you would find the whole 
thing great fun at first; but I rather think you would get 
bored. It does not seem to me as if you have ever had the 
smallest discipline, and I doubt if you have ever disci- 
plined yourself; and discipline is a tiresome thing, unless 
you like it. I think you are quick, receptive, and polite — 
all that is to the good. But are you serious ? I found 
in you a very quick perception, and you held up a flatter- 
ing mirror with great spontaneity to my mind and heart — ■ 
that was probably why I liked you so much. But I don't 
want people here to reflect me or anyone else. The whole 
point of my scheme is independence, with just enough 
discipline to keep things together, like the hem on a 
handkerchief. 

But you may have a try, if you wish; and in any case, 
I think you will have a pleasant three months here, and 
make us all sorry to lose you if you do not return. I 
have told your friend Vincent he can come, and I think 
he is more likely to stay than you are, because he is more 
himself. I don't suppose that he took in the whole place 
and the idea of it as quickly as you did. I expect you 
could write a very interesting description of it, and I 
don't expect he could. 

Still, I will say that I shall be truly sorry if, after 
this letter, you decide not to come to us. I like your 
company; and I shall not get tired of it. But to be more 
frank still, I think you are one of those charming and 
sympathetic people who is tough inside, with a toughness 
which is based on the determination to find things amus- 



The Summons 25 

ing and interesting — and that is not the sort of toughness 
I can do anything with. People like yourself are in- 
capable as a rule of suffering, whatever happens to them. 
It's a very happy disposition, but it does not grow. You 
are sensitive enough, but I don't want sensitiveness. I 
want men who are not sensitive, and who yet can suffer 
at not getting nearer and more quickly than they can to 
the purpose ahead of them, whatever that may be. It is 
a stiff sort of thing that I want. I can help to make 
a stiff nature pliable; I'm not very good at making a 
pliable nature stiff. That's the truth. 

So I shall be delighted — more than you think — if 
you say " Yes," but in a way more hopeful about you 
if you say "No." 

Come with Vincent, if you come; and as soon as 
you like. Ever yours truly, 

C. Payne. 

"Does he want me to go, or does he not?" I said. 
"Is he letting me down with a compliment?" 

"Oh no," said Vincent, "it's all right. He only 
thinks that you are a butterfly which will flutter 
by, and he would rather like you to do a little 
fluttering down there. " 

"But I'm not going to go there, " I said, "to 
wear a cap and bells for a bit, and then to be spun 
when I have left my golden store, like the radiant 
morn; he puts me on my mettle. I will go, and 
he shall keep me! I don't want to fool about any 
more." 

"All right!" said Vincent. "It's a bargain, then! 
Will you be ready to go the day after to-morrow? 
There are some things I want to buy, now that 
I'm going to school again. But I'm awfully re- 



26 Father Payne 

lieved — it's just what I want. I was getting into 
a mess with all my work, and becoming a muddled 
loafer." 

"And I an elegant trifler, it appears, " I said. 



THE SYSTEM 

WE went off together on the Saturday, and I think 
we were both decidedly nervous. What were 
we in for? I had a feeling that I had plunged head- 
long into rather a foolish adventure. 

We did not talk much on the way down; it was 
all rather solemn. We were going to put the bit 
in our mouths again, and Father Payne was an 
unknown quantity. We both felt that there was 
something decidedly big and strong there to be 
reckoned with. 

We arrived, as before, at tea-time, and we both 
received a cordial greeting. After tea Father Payne 
took us away, and told us the rules of the house. 
They were simple enough; he described the day. 
Breakfast was from 8.30 to 9.15, and was a silent 
meal. "It's a bad thing to begin the day by chatter- 
ing and arguing, " said Father Payne. Then we were 
supposed to work in our own rooms or the library 
till one. We might stroll about, if we wished, but 
there was to be no talking to anyone else, unless he 
himself gave leave for any special reason. Luncheon 
was a cold meal, quite informal, and was on the table 
for an hour. There was to be no talk then either. 
From two to five we could do as we liked, and it was 
expected that we should take at least an hour's 



28 Father Payne 

exercise, and if possible two. Tea at five, and work 
afterwards. At 8.15, dinner, and we could do as we 
wished afterwards, but we were not to congregate in 
anyone's room, and it was understood that no one was 
to go to another man's bedroom, which was also his 
study, at any time, unless he was definitely invited 
or just to ask a question. The smoking-room was 
always free for general talk, but Father Payne said 
that on the whole he discouraged any gatherings or 
cliques. The point of the whole was solitary work, 
with enough company to keep things fresh and 
comfortable. 

He said that we were expected to valet ourselves 
entirely, and that if we wanted a fire, we must lay 
it and clean it up afterwards. If we wanted to get 
anything, or have anything done, we could ask him 
or the butler. "But I rather expect everyone to 
look after himself," he said. We were not to absent 
ourselves without his leave, and we were to go away 
if he told us to do so. "Sometimes a man wants 
a little change and does not know it, " he said. 

Then he also said that he would ask us, from time to 
time, what we were doing — hear it read, and criticize 
it ; and that one of the most definite conditions of our 
remaining was that he must be satisfied that we really 
were at work. If we wanted any special books, he said 
we might ask him, and he could generally get them 
from the London Library; but that we should find a 
good many books of reference and standard works in 
the library. 

He told us, too, of certain conditions of which we 
had not heard — that we were to be away, either at 
home, or travelling wherever he chose to send us, for 
three months in the year, and he supplied the funds 



The System 29 

if necessary. Moreover, for one month in the summer 
he kept open house. Half of us were to go away for 
the first fortnight in July, and the other half were to 
stay and entertain his guests, or even our own, if we 
wished to invite them ; then the other half of the men 
returned, and had their guests to entertain, while the 
first half went away ; and that during that time there 
was to be very little work done. We were not to be 
always writing, but there was to be reading, about 
which he would advise. Once a week there was a 
meeting, on Saturday evening, when one of the men 
had to read something aloud, and be generally 
criticized. "You see the idea? " he said. "It sounds 
complicated now, but it really is very simple. It is 
just to get solid work done regularly, with a certain 
amount of supervision and criticism, and, what is 
more important still, real intervals of travelling. I 
shall send you to a particular place for a particular 
purpose, and you will have to write about it on lines 
which I shall indicate. The danger of this sort of 
life is that of getting stale. That's why I don't want 
you to see too much of each other. And last of all, " 
he said, rather gravely, "you must do what I tell you 
to do. There must be no mistake about that — but 
with all the apparent discipline of it, I believe you will 
find it worth while. " 

Then he saw us each separately. He inquired 
into our finances. Vincent had a small allowance from 
his parents, about £50, which he was told to keep for 
pocket-money, but Father Payne said he would pay 
his travelling expenses. I gathered that he gave an 
allowance to men who had nothing of their own. He 
told me that I should have to travel at my own ex- 
pense, but he was careful first to inquire whether my 



30 Father Payne 

mother was in any way dependent on me. Then he 
said to me with a smile: "I am glad you decided to 
come — I thought my letter would have offended you. 
No? That's all right. Now, I don't expect heroic 
exertions — just hard work. Mind," he said, "I will 
add one thing to my letter, and that is that I think you 
may make a success of this — if you do take to it, 
you will do well; but you will have to be patient, 
and you may have a dreary time; but I want you 
to tell me exactly at any time how you are feel- 
ing about it. You won't be driven, and I think 
your danger is that you may try to make the pace 
too much." 

He further asked me exactly what I was writing. 
It happened to be some essays on literary subjects. 
He mentioned a few books, and told me it would do 
very well to start with. He was very kind and father- 
ly in his manner, and when I rose to go, he put his 
arm through mine and said : " Come, it will be strange 
if we can't hit it off together. I like your presence 
and talk, and am glad to think you are in the house. 
Don't be anxious! The difficulty with you is that 
you will foresee all your troubles beforehand, and try 
to bolt them in a lump, instead of swallowing them one 
by one as they come. Live for the day ! " There was 
something magnetic about him, for by these few words 
he established a little special relation with me which 
was never broken. 

When he dismissed me, I went and changed my 
things, and then came down. I found that it was the 
custom for the men to go down to the hall about eight. 
Father Payne said that it was a great mistake to 
work to the last minute, and then to rush in to dinner. 
He said it made people nervous and dyspeptic. He 



The System 31 

generally strolled in himself a few minutes before, 
and sate silent by the fire. 

Just as it struck eight, and the hum of the clock 
in the hall died away, a little tune in harmony, like 
a gavotte, was played by softly-tingling tiny bells. 
I could not tell where the music came from ; it seemed 
to me like the Ariel music in The Tempest, between 
earth and heaven, or the "chiming shower of rare 
device" in The Beryl Stone. 

Father Payne smiled at the little gesture I in- 
voluntarily made. "You're right!" he said, when it 
was over. "How can people talk through that! It's 
the clock in the gallery that does it — they say it 
belonged to George III. I hope, if so, that it gave 
him a few happier moments! It is an ingenious little 
thing, with silver bells and hammers; I'll show it you 
some day. It rings every four hours. " 

"I think I had rather not see the machinery," I 
said. "I never heard anything so delicious." 

"You're right again," said Father Payne; 

" ' The isle is full of noises, 
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.' 

Let it stay at that!" 

I little thought how much I should grow to connect 
that fairy gavotte with Aveley. It always seemed 
to me like a choir of spirits. I would awake sometimes 
on summer nights and hear it chiming in the silent 
house, or at noon it would come faintly through the 
passages. That, and the songs of the birds in the 
shrubberies, always flash into my mind when I think 
of the place; because it was essentially a silent house, 
more noiseless than any I have ever lived in; and I 



32 Father Payne 

love the thought of its silence and of its fragrance — 
for that was another note of the place. In the hall 
stood great china jars with pierced covers, which were 
always full of pot-pourri; there was another in the 
library, and another in Father Payne's study, and 
two more in the passage above, which looked out by 
the little gallery upon the hall. Silence and fragrance 
always, in the background of all we did; and outlining 
itself upon the stillness, the little melody, jetting out 
like a fountain of silver sound. 



VI 

FATHER PAYNE 

THAT evening after dinner we two were left with 
Barthrop in the smoking-room, and we talked 
freely about Father Payne. Barthrop said that his 
past was a little mysterious. "He was at Marlbor- 
ough, you know, and Oxford; and after that, he lived 
in town, took pupils, and tried to write — but he was 
not successful, and had much difficulty in getting 
along." "What is his line exactly?" said Vincent. 
"That's just it," said Barthrop, "he hasn't any line. 
He has a wide knowledge of things, and is quicker at 
picking up the drift of a subject than anyone I know; 
and he has a rare power of criticism. But he isn't 
anything in particular. He can't write a bit, he is not 
a speaker, he isn't learned, he can teach able people, 
but he couldn't teach stupid men — he hasn't enough 
patience. I can't imagine any line of life for which he 
would be exactly fitted; and yet he's the biggest per- 
son I have ever met; he carries us all along with him, 
like a river. You can't resist him, you can't contra- 
dict him. That is the one danger, that he exerts 
more influence than he knows, so that when you are 
with him, it is hard to be quite yourself. But he 
puts the wind into your sails; and, my word, he can 
take it out of your sails, if he likes! I have only seen 
him really angry about twice, and then it was really 
3 33 



34 Father Payne 

appalling. Once was when a man lied to him, and 
once was when a man was impertinent to him. He 
simply blasted them with his displeasure — that is the 
only word. He hates getting angry — I expect he had 
a bad temper once — and he apologizes afterwards; 
but it's no use — it's like a thunderstorm apologizing 
to a tree which has been struck. I don't think he 
knows his strength. He believes himself to be sensi- 
tive and weak-willed — I have heard him say so. The 
fact is that he dislikes doing an unpleasant thing or 
speaking severely ; and he will take a lot of trouble to 
avoid a scene, or to keep an irritable man in a good 
temper. But if he lets himself loose ! I can't express 
to you the sort of terror I have in thinking of those 
two occasions. He didn't say very much, but he 
looked as if he were possessed by any number of 
devils." 

"He was never married, I suppose?" I said. 

"No," said Barthrop, "and yet he seems to make 
friends with women very easily — in fact, they tend to 
fall in love with him, if I may say so. He has got a 
beautiful manner with them, and he is simply devoted 
to children. You will see that they really rather 
worship him in the village. He knows everyone in 
the place, and never forgets a fact about them." 

"What does he do mostly?" I said. 

"I really don't know," said Barthrop. "He is 
rather a solitary man. He very often has one of 
us in for an hour in the evening or morning — but 
we don't see much of him in the afternoon; he gardens 
or walks about. He has a quick eye for things, birds, 
and plants, and so on; and he can find more nests in 
an hour than any man I ever saw. Sometimes he 
will go and shut himself up in the church — he is rather 



Father Payne 35 

fond of going to church; he always goes to the 
Communion." 

"Does he expect us to go?" I said. 

"No," said Barthrop. "He rather likes us to go, 
but he doesn't at all like us going to please him. ' I 
want you to want to go, ' I heard him say once, ' but 
I don't want you to go because I want you. ' And he 
has no particular views, I think, about the whole 
thing — at least not for other people. " 

"Tell me some more about him," I said. 

"What is there to say?" said Barthrop. "He is 
just there — the biggest fact on the horizon. Oh 
yes, there is one thing; he is tremendously devoted 
to music. We have some music in the evenings very 
often. You saw the organ in the gallery — it is rather 
a fine one, and he generally has someone here who can 
play. Lestrange is a first-rate musician. Father 
Payne can't play himself, but he knows all about it, 
and composes sometimes. But I think he looks on 
music as rather a dangerous indulgence, and does not 
allow himself very much of it. You can see how it 
affects him. And you mustn't be taken in by his 
manner. You might think him heavy and unpercep- 
tive, with that quiet and rather secret eye of his; yet 
he notices everything, always, and far quicker than 
anyone else. But it is hard to describe him, because 
he can't do anything much, and you might think he 
was indolent; and yet he is the biggest person I have 
ever seen, the one drawback being that he credits 
other people with being big too." 

"I notice that you call him 'Father Payne,'" said 
Vincent. "Does that mean anything in particular?" 

"No," said Barthrop, smiling. "It began as a 
sort of joke, I believe — but it seemed to fit him; and 



36 Father Payne 

it's rather convenient. We can't begin by calling 
him 'Payne,' and 'Mr. Payne' is a little formal. 
Some of the men call him ' sir, ' but I think he likes 
'Father Payne' best, or simply 'Father.' You will 
find it exactly expresses him." 

"Yes," I said, "I am sure it does!" 

I did not sleep much that night. The great change 
in my life had all taken place with such rapidity 
and ease that I felt bewildered, and the thought of 
the time ahead was full of a vague excitement. But 
most of all the thought of Father Payne ran in my 
mind. I regarded him with a singular mixture of 
interest, liking, admiration, and dread. Yet he had 
contrived to kindle a curious flame in my mind. 
It was not that I fully understood what he was 
working for, but I was conscious of a great desire 
to prove to him that I could do something, exhibit 
some tenacity, approve myself to him. I wanted 
to make him retract what he had said about me; 
and, further on, I had a dim sense of an initiation 
into ideas, familiar enough, but which had only 
been words to me hitherto — power, purpose, serious- 
ness. They had been ideas which before this had just 
vaguely troubled my peace, clouds hanging in a 
bright sky. I had the sense that there were some 
duties which I ought to perform, efforts to be made, 
ends to fulfil; but they had seemed to me expressed 
in rather priggish phrases, words which oppressed me, 
and ruffled the surface of my easy joy. Now they 
loomed up before me as big realities which could not 
be escaped, hills to climb, with no pleasant path 
round about their bases. I seemed in sight of some 
inspiring secret. I could not tell what it was, but 
Father Payne knew it, might show it me. 



Father Payne 37 

Thus I drowsed and woke, a dozen times, till in 
the glimmer of the early light I rose and drew back 
my curtains. The dawn was struggling up fitfully 
in the east, among cloudy bars, tipping and edging 
them with smouldering flashes of light, and there was 
a lustrous radiance in the air. Then, to my surprise, 
looking down at the silent garden, pale with dew, I 
saw the great figure of Father Payne, bare-headed, 
wrapt in a cloak, pacing solidly and, I thought, hap- 
pily among the shrubberies, stopping every now and 
then to watch the fiery light and to breathe the in- 
vigorating air — and I felt then that, whatever he 
might be doing, he at all events was something, in a 
sense which applied to but few people I knew. He 
was not hard, unimaginative, fenced in by stupidity 
and self-righteousness from unhappiness and doubt 
as were some of the men accounted successful whom 
I knew. No, it was something positive, some self- 
created light, some stirring of hidden force, that 
emanated from him, such as I had never encountered 
before. 



VII 

THE MEN 

I CAN attempt no sort of chronicle of our days, 
1 which indeed were quiet and simple enough. I 
have only preserved in my diary the record of a few 
scenes and talks and incidents. I will, however, 
first indicate how our party, as I knew it, was con- 
stituted, so that the record may be intelligible. 

First of us came Leonard Barthrop, who was, 
partly by his seniority and partly by his temperament, 
a sort of second-in-command in the house, much 
consulted and trusted by Father Payne. He was 
a man of about thirty-five, grave, humorous, pleasant. 
If one was in a minor difficulty, too trivial to take to 
Father Payne, it was natural to consult Barthrop; 
and he sometimes, too, would say a word of warning 
to a man, if a storm seemed to be brewing. It must 
not be denied that men occasionally got on Father 
Payne's nerves, quite unconsciously, through tact- 
lessness or stupid mannerisms — and Barthrop was 
able to smooth the situation out by a word in season. 
He had a power of doing this without giving offence, 
from the obvious goodwill which permeated all he did. 
Barthrop was not very sociable or talkative, and 
he was occupied, I think, in some sort of historical 
research — I believe he has since made his name as 
a judicious and interesting historian; but I knew 
38 



The Men 39 

little of what he was doing, and indeed was hardly 
intimate with him, though always at ease in his 
company. He was not a man with strong pre- 
ferences or prejudices, nor was he in any sense a 
brilliant or suggestive writer. I think he had merged 
himself very much in the life of our little society, and 
kept things together more than I was at first aware. 
Then came Kaye, one of the least conspicuous of 
the whole group, though he has since become per- 
haps the best known, by his poems and his beautiful 
critical studies in both art and literature. Kaye 
is known as one of those rare figures in literature, 
a creative critic. His rich and elaborate style, his 
exquisite side-lights, his poetical faculty of inter- 
pretation, make his work famous, though hardly 
popular. But I found that he worked very slowly 
and even painfully, deliberately secreting his honey, 
and depositing it cell by cell. He had a peculiar 
intimacy with Father Payne, who treated him with 
a marked respect. Kaye was by far the most ab- 
sorbed of the party, went and came like a great moth, 
was the first to disappear, and generally the last to 
arrive. Neither did he make any attempt at friend- 
ship. He was a handsome and graceful fellow, now 
about thirty, with a worn sort of beauty in his striking 
features, curling hair, long languid frame, and fine 
hands. His hands, I used to think, were the most 
eloquent things about him, and he was ever making 
silent little gestures with them, as though they were 
accompanying unuttered trains of thought ; but he had 
too, a strained and impatient air, as if he found the 
pursuit of phrases a wearing and hazardous occu- 
pation. I used to feel Kaye the most attractive 
and impressive of our society; but he neither made 



40 Father Payne 

nor noticed any signals of goodwill, though always 
courteous and kindly. 

Pollard was a totally different man; he was about 
twenty-eight, and he was writing some work of fiction. 
He was a small, sturdy, rubicund creature, with beady 
eyes and pink cheeks, cherubic in aspect, entirely 
good-natured and lively, full of not very exalted 
humour, and with a tendency to wild and even hys- 
terical giggling. I used to think that Father Payne 
did not like him very much; but he was a quick and 
regular worker, and it was impossible to find fault 
with him. He was extremely sociable and appreci- 
ative, and I used to find his company a relief from the 
strain which at times made itself felt. Pollard had a 
way of getting involved in absurd adventures, which 
he related with immense gusto; and he had a really 
wonderful power of description — more so in conversa- 
tion than in writing — and of humorous exaggeration, 
which made him a delightful companion. But he was 
never able to put the best of himself into his books, 
which tended to be sentimental and even conventional. 

Then there was Lestrange; and I think he was the 
least congenial of the lot. He was a handsome, rather 
clerical-looking man of about twenty-eight, who had 
been brought up to take Orders, and had decided 
against doing so. He was very much in earnest, in 
rather a tiresome way, and his phrases were conven- 
tional and pietistic. I used to feel that he jarred a 
good deal on Father Payne, but much was forgiven 
him because of his musical talents, which were really 
remarkable. His organ-playing, with its verve, its 
delicacy, and its quiet mastery, was delicious to hear. 
He was engaged in writing music mainly, and had a 
piano all to himself in a little remote room beyond the 



The Men 41 

dining-room, which looked out to the stable-yard and 
had formerly been an estate-office. We used to hear 
faint sounds wafted down the garden when the wind 
was in the west. He was friendly, but he had the 
absorption of the musician in his art, which is unlike 
all other artistic absorptions, because it seems literally 
to check the growth of other qualities and interests. 
In fact, in many ways Lestrange was like a pious child. 
He was apt to be snubbed by Father Payne, but he was 
wholly indifferent to all irony. I used to listen to him 
playing the organ in the evenings, and a language of 
emotions and visions certainly streamed from his 
fingers which he was never able to put into words. 
Father Payne treated him as one might treat an in- 
spired fool, with a mixture of respect and sharpness. 
Then there was Rose, a man of twenty-five, a 
curious mixture of knowledge, cynicism, energy, and 
affectionateness. I found Rose a very congenial 
companion, though I never felt sure what he thought, 
and never aired my enthusiasms in his presence. 
He had great aplomb, and was troubled by no shyness 
nor hesitation. There was a touch of frostiness at 
times between him and Father Payne. Rose was 
paradoxical and whimsical, and was apt to support 
fantastic positions with apparent earnestness. But 
he was an extremely capable and sensible man, and 
had a knack of dropping his contentiousness the 
moment it began to give offence. He was by far the 
most mundane of us, and had some command of 
money. I used to fancy that Father Payne was a little 
afraid of him, when he displayed his very considerable 
knowledge of the world. His father was a wealthy 
man, a member of Parliament, and Rose really knew 
social personages of the day. I doubt if he was ever 



42 Father Payne 

quite in sympathy with the idea of the place, but I 
used to feel that his presence was a wholesome sort 
of corrective, like the vinegar in the salad. I be- 
lieve he was writing a play, but he has done nothing 
since in literature, and was in many ways more like a 
visitor than an inmate. 

Then came my friend Vincent, a solid, good-natured 
hard-working man, with a real enthusiasm for litera- 
ture, not very critical or even imaginative, but with a 
faculty for clear and careful writing. He was at work 
on a realistic novel, which made some little reputation; 
but he has become since, what I think he always was 
meant to be, an able journalist and an excellent leader- 
writer on political and social topics. Vincent was the 
most interested of all of us in current affairs, but at the 
same time had a quiet sort of enthusiasm, and a power 
of idealizing people, ardently but unsentimentally, 
which made him the most loyal of friends. 

The only other person of whom we saw anything 
was the Vicar of the parish — a safe, decorous, useful 
man, a distant cousin of Father Payne's. His wife 
was a good-humoured and conventional woman. 
Their two daughters were pleasant, unaffected girls, 
just come to womanhood. Lestrange afterwards 
married one of them. 

We were not much troubled by sociabilities. The 
place was rather isolated, and Father Payne had the 
reputation of being something of an eccentric. More- 
over, the big neighbouring domain, Whitbury Park, 
blocked all access to north and west. The owner was 
an old and invalid peer, who lived a very secluded life 
and entertained no one. To the south there was 
nothing for miles but farms and hamlets, while the 
only near neighbour in the east was a hunting squire, 



The Men 43 

who thought Father Payne kept a sort of boarding- 
house, and ignored him entirely. The result was that 
callers were absolutely unknown, and the wildest form 
of dissipation was that Pollard and Rose occasionally 
played lawn-tennis at neighbouring vicarages. 

We were not often all there together, because Father 
Payne's scheme of travel was strictly adhered to. He 
considered it a very integral part of our life. I never 
quite knew what his plan was; but he would send a 
man off, generally alone, with a solid sum for travel- 
ling expenses. Thus Lestrange was sent for a month 
to Berlin when Joachim held court there, or to Dresden 
and Munich. I remember Pollard and Vincent being 
packed off to Switzerland together to climb mountains 
with stern injunctions to be sociable. Rose went to 
Spain, to Paris, to St. Petersburg. Kaye went more 
than once to Italy; but we often went to different 
parts of England, and then we were generally allowed 
to go together; but Father Payne's theory was that 
we should travel alone, learn to pick up friends, and 
to fend for ourselves. He had acquaintances in several 
parts of the Continent, and we were generally provided 
with a letter of introduction to someone. We had a 
fortnight in June and a fortnight at Christmas to go 
home — so that we were always away for three months 
in the year, while Father Payne was apt to send us 
off for a week at a time, if he thought we needed a 
change. Barthrop, I think, made his own plans, and 
it was all reasonable enough, as Father Payne would 
always listen to objections. Some of us paid for our- 
selves on those tours, but he was always willing to 
supplement it generously. 

It used to be a puzzle to me how Father Payne had 
the command of so much money; his estate was not 



44 Father Payne 

large; but in the first place he spent very little on 
himself, and our life was extremely simple. More- 
over, I became aware that some of his former pupils 
and friends used to send him money at times for this 
express purpose. 

The staff consisted of the old butler, whose wife 
was cook. There were three other maidservants; the 
gardener was also coachman. The house was cer- 
tainly clean and well-kept; we looked after ourselves 
to a great extent; but there was never any apparent 
lack of money, though, on the other hand, there was 
every sign of careful economy. Father Payne never 
talked about money. "It's an interesting thing, 
money," I have heard him say, "and it's curious to 
see how people handle it — but we must not do it too 
much honour, and it isn't a thing that can be spoken 
of in general conversation. " 



VIII 



THE METHOD 



I DO not propose to make any history of events, 
or to say how, within a very short time, I fell into 
the life of the place. I will only say what were the 
features of the scheme, and how the rule, such as it 
was, worked out. 

First of all, and above all, came the personality of 
Father Payne, which permeated and sustained the 
whole affair. It was not that he made it his business 
to drive us along. It was not a case of "the guiding 
hand in front and the propelling foot behind. " He 
seldom interfered, and sometimes for a considerable 
space one would have no very direct contact with him. 
He was a man who was always intent, but by no means 
always intent on shepherding. I should find it hard 
to say how he spent his time. He was sometimes to 
all appearances entirely indolent and good-natured, 
when he would stroll about, talk to the people in the 
village, and look after the little farm which he kept in 
his own hands under a bailiff. At another time he 
would be for long together in an abstracted mood, 
silent, absent-minded, pursuing some train of thought. 
At another time he would be very busy with what we 
were doing, and hold long interviews with us, making us 
read our work to him and giving us detailed criticisms. 
On these occasions he was extremely stimulating, for 
.45 



46 Father Payne 

the simple reason that he always seemed to grasp 
what it was that one was aiming at, and his criticisms 
were all directed to the question of how far the original 
conception was being worked out. He did not, as a 
rule, point out a different conception, or indicate how 
the work could be done on other lines. He always 
grasped the plan and intention, and really seemed to 
be inside the mind of the contriver. He would say: 
"I think the scheme is weak here — and you can't 
make a weak place strong by filling it with details, 
however good in themselves. That is like trying to 
mend the Slough of Despond with cartloads of texts. 
The thing is not to fall in, or, if you fall in, to get out." 
His three divisions of a subject were "what you say, 
what you wanted to say, what you ought to have 
wanted to say. " Sometimes he would listen in silence 
and then say: "I can't criticize that — it is all off the 
lines. You had better destroy it and begin again." 
Or he would say: "You had better revise that and 
polish it up. It won't be any good when it is done — 
these patched-up things never are; but it will be good 
practice." He was encouraging, because he never 
overlooked the good points of any piece of writing. 
He would say: "The detail is good, but it is all too 
big for its place, quite out of scale; it is like a huge ear 
on a small head." Or he would say: "Those are all 
things worth saying and well said, but they are much 
too diffuse. " He used to tell me that I was apt to stop 
the carriage when I was bound on a rapid transit, and 
go for a saunter among fields. "I don't object to 
your sauntering, but you must intend to saunter — you 
must not be attracted by a pleasant footpath." 
Sometimes he could be severe. "That's vulgar," he 
once said to me, "and you can't make it attractive by 



The Method 47 

throwing scent about." Or he would say: "That's 
a platitude — which means that it may be worth think- 
ing and feeling, but not worth saying. You can de- 
pend upon your reader feeling it without your help. " 
Or he would say: "You don't understand that point. 
It is a case of the blind leading the blind. Cut the 
whole passage, and think it out again. " Or he would 
say: "That is all too compressed. You began by 
walking, and now you are jumping. " Or he would say : 
"There is a note of personal irritation about that; it 
sounds as if you had been reading an unpleasant review. 
It is like the complaint of the nightingale leaning her 
breast against a thorn in order to get the sensation of 
pain. You seem to be wiping your eyes all through — 
you have not got far enough away from your vexation. 
Your attempt to give it a humorous turn reminds me 
of Miss Squeers' titter — you must never titter!" 
Once or twice in early times I used to ask him how he 
would do it. "Don't ask me!" he said. "I haven't 
got to do it — that's your business ; its no use your doing 
it in my way ; all I know is that you are not doing it in 
your way." He was very quick at noticing any man- 
nerisms or favourite words. "All good writers have 
mannerisms, of course," he would say, "but the 
moment that the reader sees that it is a mannerism 
the charm is gone. " His praise was rarely given, and 
when it came it was generous and rich. "That is 
excellent," I can hear him say. "You have filled your 
space exactly, and filled it well. There is not a word 
to add or to take away." He was always prepared 
to listen to argument or defence. "Very well — read 
it again." Then, at the end, he would say: "Yes, 
there is something in that. You meant to anticipate? 
I don't mind that! But you have anticipated too 



48 Father Payne 

much, made it too clear; it should just be a hint, no 
more, which will be explained later. Don't blurt! 
You have taken the wind out of your sails by explaining 
it too fully." 

Sometimes he would leave us alone for two or 
three weeks together, and then say frankly that 
one had been wasting time, or the reverse. "You 
must not depend upon me too much; you must learn 
to walk alone. " 

Every week we had a meeting, at which someone 
read a fragment aloud. At these meetings he criti- 
cized little himself, but devoted his attention to our 
criticisms. He would not allow harshness or abrupt- 
ness in what we said. "We don't want your conclu- 
sions or your impressions — we want your reasons." Or 
he would say: "That is a fair criticism, but unsym- 
pathetic. It is in the spirit of a reviewer who wants 
to smash a man. We don't want Stephen to be 
stoned here, we want him confuted. " I remember 
once how he said with indignation: "That is simply 
throwing a rotten egg! And its maturity shows that 
it was kept for that purpose ! You are not criticizing, 
you are only paying off an old score!" 

But I think that the two ways in which he most 
impressed himself were by his conversation, when we 
were all together, and by his tete-a-tete talks, if one 
happened to be his companion. When we were all 
together he was humorous, ironical, frank. He did 
not mind what was said to him, so long as it was 
courteously phrased; but I have heard him say: 
"We must remember we are fencing — we must not 
use bludgeons." Or: "You must not talk as if you 
were scaring birds away — we are all equal here." 
Pie was very unguarded himself in what he said, and 



The Method 49 

always maintained that talkers ought to contribute 
their own impressions freely and easily. He used to 
quote with much approval Dr. Johnson's remark about 
his garrulous old school-fellow, Edwards. Boswell 
said, when Edwards had gone, that he thought him a 
weak man. "Why, yes, sir," said Johnson. "Here 
is a man who has passed through life without ex- 
periences ; yet I would rather have him with me than 
a more sensible man who will not talk readily. This 
man is always willing to say what he has to say. " 
Father Payne used to add: "The point is to talk; 
you must not consider your reputation ; say whatever 
comes into your head, and when you have learnt to 
talk, you can begin to select." I have heard him 
say: "Go on, someone! It is everybody's business 
here to avoid a pause. Don't be sticky! Pauses are 
for a tete-a-tete." Or, again, I have heard him say: 
"You mustn't examine witnesses here! You should 
never ask more than three questions running." He 
did not by any means keep his own rules; but he 
would apologize sometimes for his shortcomings. 
"I'm hopeless to-day. I can't attend, I can't think 
of anything in particular. I'm diluted, I'm weltering 
— I'm coming down like a shower." 

The result of this certainly was that we most of us 
did learn to talk. He liked to thrash a subject out, 
but he hated too protracted a discussion. "Here, 
we've had enough of this. It's very important, but 
I'm getting bored. I feel priggish. Help, help!" 

On the other hand, he was even more delightful 
in a tete-a-tete. He would say profound and tender 
things, let his emotions escape him. He had with 
me, and I expect with others, a sort of indulgent 
and paternal way with him. He never forgot a 



50 Father Payne 

confidence, and he used to listen delightedly to stories 
of one's home circle. "Tell me some stories about 
Aunt Jane," he would say to me. "There is some- 
thing impotently fiery about that good lady that I 
like. Tell me again what she said when she found 
cousin Frank in a smoking-cap reading Thomas-a- 
Kempis. " He had a way of quoting one's own stories 
which was subtly flattering, and he liked sidelights 
of a good-natured kind on the character of other 
members. "Why won't he say such things to me?" 
he used to say. "He thinks I should respect him less, 
when really I should admire him more. He won't let 
me see when his box is empty ! I suspect him of reading 
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations before he goes a walk 
with me!" Or he would say: "In a general talk you 
must think about your companions ; in a tete-a-tete you 
must only feel him." 

But the most striking thing about Father Payne 
was this. Though we were all very conscious of his 
influence, and indeed of his authority; though we knew 
that he meant to have his own way, and was quite 
prepared to speak frankly and act decisively, we were 
never conscious of being watched or censured or inter- 
fered with. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred it 
was a pure pleasure to meet him and to be with him, 
and many a time have I seen him, in a moment of 
leisure, strolling in the garden, and hurried out just 
on the chance of getting a word or a smile, or, if he 
was in an expansive mood, having my arm taken by 
him for a little turn. In the hundredth case, it 
happened that one might have said or done something 
which one knew that he would disapprove. But, 
as he never stored things up or kept you waiting, you 
could be sure he would speak soon or not at all. Often 



The Method 51 

too, he would just say: "I don't think that your 
remark to Kaye gave a fair impression of yourself," 
or, "Why waste your powder as you did to-night?" 
I was only once or twice directly rebuked by him, and 
that was for a prolonged neglect. "You don't care, " 
he once said to me emphatically. "I can't do any- 
thing for you if you don't care ! " But he was the most 
entirely placable of men. A word of regret or apology 
and he would say : " Don't give it another thought, my 
boy," or, "That's all right, then." 

The real secret of his influence was that he took not 
a critical or even a dispassionate view of each of us, 
but an enthusiastic view. He took no pleasure in our 
shortcomings; they were rather of the nature of an 
active personal disappointment. The result was 
simply that you were natural with him, but natural 
with the added sense that he liked you and thought 
well of you, and expected friendship and even brilliance 
from you. You felt that he knew you well, and recog- 
nized your faults and weaknesses, but that he knew 
your best side even better, and enjoyed the presence 
of it. I never knew anyone who was so appreciative, 
and though I said foolish things to him sometimes, I 
felt that he was glad that I should be my undisguised 
self. It was thus delicately flattering to be with him, 
and it gave confidence and self-respect. That was the 
basis of our whole life, the goodwill and affection of 
Father Payne, and the desire to please him. 



IX 

FATHER PAYNE 

FATHER PAYNE was a big solid man, as I have 
said, but he contrived to give the impression of 
being even bigger than he was. It was like the Irish 
estate, of which its owner said that it had more land to 
the acre than any place he knew. This was the result, 
I suppose, of what Barthrop once dryly called the 
"effortless expansion" of Father Payne's personality. 
I suppose he was about six-foot-two in height, and he 
must have weighed fifteen stone or even more. He 
was not stout, but all his limbs were solid, so that he 
filled his clothes. His hands were big, his feet were 
big. He wore a rather full beard : he was slightly bald 
when I knew him, but his hair grew rather long and 
curly. He always wore old clothes — but you were 
never conscious of what he wore: he never looked, as 
some people do, like a suit of clothes with a person 
inside them. Thinking it over, it seems to me that 
the reason why you noticed his clothes so little, when 
you were with him, was because you were always 
observing his face, or his hands, which were extremely 
characteristic of him, or his motions, which had a 
lounging sort of grace about them. Heavy men are 
apt on occasions to look lumbering, but Father Payne 
never looked that. His whole body was under his 
full control. When he walked, he swung easily along; 
52 . 



Father Payne 53 

when he moved, he moved impetuously and eagerly. 
But his face was the most remarkable thing about him. 
It had no great distinction of feature, and it was san- 
guine, often sunburnt, in hue. But, solid as it was, 
it was all alive. His big dark eyes were brimful of 
amusement and kindliness, and it was like coming into 
a warm room on a cold day to have his friendly glance 
directed upon you. As he talked, his eyebrows moved 
swiftly, and he had a look, with his eyes half-closed 
and his brows drawn up, as he waited for an answer, 
of what the old books call "quizzical" — a sort of half- 
caressing irony, which was very attractive. He had 
an impatient little frown which passed over his face, 
like a ruffle of wind, if things went too slowly or 
heavily for his taste; and he had, too, on occasions a 
deep, abstracted look, as if he were following a thought 
far. There was also another look, well known to his 
companions, when he turned his eyes upwards with a 
sort of resignation, generally accompanied by a 
deprecating gesture of the hand. Altogether it was 
a most expressive face, because, except in his ab- 
stracted mood, he always seemed to be entirely there, 
not concealing or repressing anything, but bending 
his whole mind upon what was being said. Moreover, 
if you said anything personal or intimate to him, a word 
of gratitude or pleasure, he had a quick, beautiful, 
affectionate look, so rewarding, so embracing that I 
often tried to evoke it — though an attempt to evoke 
it deliberately often produced no more than a half- 
smile, accompanied by a little wink, as if he saw 
through the attempt. 

His great soft white hands, always spotlessly clean — 
he was the cleanest-looking man I ever saw — were 
really rather extraordinary. They looked at first 



54 Father Payne 

sight clumsy, and even limp; but he was unusually 
deft and adroit with his fingers, and his touch on 
plants, in gardening, his tying of strings — he liked 
doing up parcels — was very quick and delicate. He 
was fond of all sorts of little puzzles, toys of wood and 
metal, which had to be fitted together; and the puzzles 
took shape or fell to pieces under his fingers like magic. 
They were extremely sensitive to pain, his hands, and 
a little pinch or abrasion would cause him marked 
discomfort. His handwriting was rapid and fine, 
and he occasionally would draw a tiny sketch to illus- 
trate something, which showed much artistic skill. 
He often deplored his ignorance of handicraft, which 
he said would have been a great relief to him. 

His voice, again, was remarkable. It was not in 
ordinary talk either deep or profound, though it could 
and did become both on occasions, especially when he 
made a quotation, which he did with some solemnity. 
I used at first to think that there was a touch of 
rhetorical affectation about his quotations. They 
were made in a high musical tone, and as often as not 
ended with the tears coming into his eyes. He spoke 
to me once about this. He said that it was a mistake 
to think he was deeply affected by a quotation. "In 
fact, " he said, "I am not easily affected by passionate 
or tragic emotion — what does affect me is a peculiar 
touch of beauty, but it is a luxurious and superficial 
thing. It would entirely prevent me," he added, 
"from reading many poems or prose passages aloud 
which I greatly admire. I simply could not command 
myself! In fact," he went on, smiling, "I very often 
can only get to the end of a quotation by fixing my 
mind on something else. I add up the digits giving 
the number of the page, or I count the plates at the 



Father Payne 55 

dinner-table. It's very absurd — but it takes me in 
just the same way when I am alone. I could not read 
the last chapter of the Book of Revelation aloud to 
myself, or the chapter on ' The Wilderness ' in Isaiah 
without shedding tears. But it doesn't mean any- 
thing; it is just the hysterica passio, you know!" 

His voice, when he first joined in a talk, was often 
low and even hesitating; but when he became inter- 
ested and absorbed, it gathered volume and emphasis. 
Barthrop once said to me that Father Payne was the 
only person he knew who always talked in italics. 
But he very seldom harangued, though it is difficult 
to make that clear in recording his talks, because he 
often spoke continuously. Yet it was never a solil- 
oquy: he always included the listeners. He used to 
look round at them, explore their faces, catch an eye 
and smile, indicate the particular person addressed by a 
darted-out finger ; and he had many little free gestures 
with his hands as he talked. He would trace little 
hieroglyphics with his finger, as if he were writing 
a word, sweep an argument aside, bring his hands 
together as though he were shaping something. This 
was a little confusing at first, and used to divert my 
attention, because of the great mobility of his hands; 
but after a little it seemed to me to bring out and 
illustrate his points in a remarkably salient way. 

His habits were curious and a little mysterious. 
They were by no means regular. Sometimes for 
days together we hardly saw him. He often rose 
early and walked in the garden. If he found a book 
which interested him, he would read it with absorbed 
attention, quite unconscious of the flight of time. 
"I do love getting really buried in a book," he would 
say; "it's the best of tests." Sometimes he wrote, 



56 Father Payne 

sometimes he composed music, sometimes he would 
have his table covered with bits of paper full of un- 
intelligible designs and patterns. He did not mind 
being questioned, but he would not satisfy one's 
curiosity. "It's only some nonsense of mine," he 
would say. He did not write many letters, and they 
were generally short. At times he would be very busy 
on his farm, at times occupied in the village, at times 
he took long walks alone; very occasionally he went 
away for a day or two. He was both uncommunica- 
tive and communicative. He would often talk with 
the utmost frankness and abandon about his private 
affairs; but, on the other hand, I always had the sense 
of much that was hidden in his life. And I have no 
doubt that he spent much time in prayer and medita- 
tion. He seldom spoke of this, but it played a large 
part in his life. He gave the impression of great ease, 
cheerfulness, and tranquillity, attained by some de- 
liberate resolve, because he was both restless and sensi- 
tive, took sorrows and troubles hardly, and was 
deeply shocked and distressed by sad news of any 
kind. I have heard him say that he often had great 
difficulty in forcing himself to open a letter which he 
thought likely to be distressing or unpleasant. He 
was naturally, I imagine, of an almost neurotic tend- 
ency; but he did not seem so much to combat this by 
occupation and determination as to have arrived at 
some mechanical way of dealing with it. I remember 
that he said to me once: "If you have a bad business 
on hand, an unhappy or wounding affair, it is best to 
receive it fully and quietly. Let it do its worst, realize 
it, take it in — don't resist it, don't try to distract your 
mind: see the full misery of it, don't attempt to mini- 
mize it. If you do that, you will suddenly find some- 



Father Payne 57 

thing within you come to your rescue and say, 'Well, 
I can bear that!' and then it is all right. But if you 
try to dodge it, it's my experience that there comes a 
kind of back-wash which hurts very much indeed. 
Let the stream go over you, and then emerge. To 
fight against it simply prolongs the agony." He 
certainly recovered himself quicker than anyone I 
have ever known : indeed I think his recuperation was 
the best sign of his enormous vitality. "I'm sen- 
sitive," he said to me once, "but I'm tough — I have 
a fearful power of forgetting — it's much better than 
forgiving." But the thing which remains most 
strongly in my mind about him is the way in which he 
pervaded the whole place. It was fancy, perhaps,'but 
I used to think I knew whether he was in the house or 
not. Certainly, if I wanted to speak to him, I used to 
go off to his study on occasions, quite sure that I 
should find him; while on other occasions — and I 
more than once put this to the test — I have thought to 
myself, "It's no use going — the Father is out." His 
presence at any sort of gathering was entirely unmis- 
takable. It was not that you felt hampered or con- 
trolled: it was more like the flowing of some clear 
stream. When he was away, the thing seemed tame 
and spiritless; when he was there, it was all full of life. 
But his presence was not, at least to me, at all weari- 
some or straining. I have known men of great vitality 
who were undeniably fatiguing, because they over- 
came one like a whirlwind. But with Father Payne 
it always seemed as though he put wind into one's 
sails, but left one to steer one's own course. He did 
not thwart or deflect, or even direct : he simply multi- 
plied one's own energy. I never had the sensation 
with him of suppressing any thought in my mind, or of 



58 Father Payne 

saying to myself, "The Father won't care about that." 
He always did care, and I used to feel that he was glad 
to be inquired of, glad to have his own thoughts 
diverted, glad to be of use. He never nagged, or 
found petty fault, or "chivied" you, as the boys say. 
If you asked him a question, or asked him to stroll or 
walk, you always felt that he was delighted, that it was 
the one thing he enjoyed. He liked to have childish 
secrets. He and I had several little caches in the 
holes of trees, or the chinks of buildings, where we 
concealed small coins or curious stones on our walks, 
and at a later date revisited them. We were frankly 
silly about certain things. He and I had some 
imaginary personages — Dr. Waddilove, supposed to be 
a rich beneficed clergyman of Tory views; Mr. Mc- 
Turk, a matter-of-fact Scotsman; Henry Bland, a 
retired schoolmaster with copious stores of informa- 
tion; and others — and we used often to discourse in 
character. But he always knew when to stop. He 
would say to me suddenly: "Dr. Waddilove said to 
me yesterday that he never argued with atheists or 
radicals, because they always came round in the end. " 
Or he would say, in Henry Bland's flute-like tones: 
"Your mention of Robert Browning induces me to 
relate an anecdote, which I think may prove not 
wholly uninteresting to you." At times we used to 
tell long stories on our walks, stopping short in the 
middle of a sentence, when the other had instantly to 
continue the narrative. I do not mean that the wit 
was very choice or the humour at all remarkable — it 
would not bear being written down — but it amused us 
both. "Come, what shall we do to-day?" I can 
hear him say. "Dr. Waddilove and Mr. Bland 
might have a walk and discuss the signs of the 



Father Payne 59 

times?" And then the ridiculous dialogue would 
begin. 

That was the delightful thing about him, that he 
was always ready to fall in with a mood, always light 
of touch and gay. He could be tender and sympa- 
thetic, as well as incisive and sensible if it was needed ; 
but he was never either contradictory or severe or 
improving. He would sometimes pull himself up 
and say: "Here, we must be business-like, " but he 
was never reproachful or grieved or shocked by what 
we said to him. He could be decisive, stern, abrupt, 
if it was really needed. But his most pungent reproofs 
were inflicted by a blank silence, which was one of the 
most appalling things to encounter. He generally 
began to speak again a few moments later, on a totally 
different subject, while any such sign of displeasure 
was extremely rare. He never under any circum- 
stances reminded anyone of his generosity, or the 
trouble he had taken, or the favours he had conferred, 
while he would often remind one of some trifling 
kindness done to him. "I often remember how good 
you were about those accounts, old boy! I should 
never have got through without you!" 

His demeanour was generally that of an indulgent 
uncle, with that particular touch of nearness which in 
England is apt to exist only among relations. He 
would consult us about his own private worries with 
entire frankness, and this more than anything made us 
ready to confide in him. He used to hand us cheques 
or money if required, with a little wink. "That's 
your screw!" he used to say; and he liked any thanks 
that seemed natural. 

"Natural," — that is the word that comes before me 
all through. I can remember no one so unembar- 



60 Father Payne 

rassed, so easy, so transparent. His thought flowed 
into his talk; and his silences were not reticences, but 
the busy silence of the child who has "a plan." He 
gave himself away without economy and without 
disguise, and he accepted gratefully and simply 
whatever you cared to give him of thought or love. 
I think oftenest of how I sometimes went to see him in 
the evenings : if he was busy, as he often was, he used 
just to murmur half to himself, "Well, old man?" 
indicate a chair, put his finger on his lips, and go on 
with his work or his book; but at intervals he would 
just glance at me with a little smile, and I knew that 
he was glad to have me at hand in that simple com- 
panionship when there is no need of speech or explana- 
tion. And then the book or paper would be dropped, 
and he would say: "Well, out with it." If one said, 
"Nothing — only company," he would give one of his 
best and sweetest smiles. 



X 

CHARACTERISTICS 

BUT whatever may have been Father Payne's 
effect upon us individually or collectively, or 
however the result may have been achieved, there was 
no question of one thing, and that was the ardent and 
beautiful happiness of the place. Joy deliberately 
schemed for and planned is apt to evaporate. But 
we were not hunting for happiness as men dig for 
gold. We were looking for something quite different. 
We were all doing work for which we cared, with kind 
and yet incisive criticism to help us; and then the 
simplicity and regularity of the life, the total absence 
of all indulgence, the exercise, the companionship, 
the discipline, all generated a kind of high spirits that 
I have known in no other place and at no other time. 
I used to awake in the morning fresh and alert, free 
from all anxiety, all sense of tiresome engagements, all 
possibility of boredom. All staleness, weariness, all 
complications and conventional duties, all jealousies 
and envyings, were absent. We were not competing 
with each other, we were not bent on asserting our- 
selves, we had just each our own bit of work to do; 
moreover our spaces of travel had an invigorating 
effect, and sent us back to Aveley with the zest of 
returning to a beloved home. Of course there were 
little bickerings at times, little complexities of friend- 
61 



62 Father Payne 

ship; but these never came to anything in Father 
Payne's kindly presence. Sometimes a man would get 
fretful or worried over his work; if so, he was generally 
despatched on a brief holiday, with an injunction to 
do no work at all; and I am sure that the prospect 
of even temporary banishment was the strongest of all 
motives for the suppression of strife. I remember 
spring mornings, when the birds began to sing in the 
shrubberies, and the beds were full of rising flower- 
blades, when one's whole mind and heart used to ex- 
pand in an ecstasy of hope and delight; I remember 
long rambles or bicycle rides far into the quiet pastoral 
country, in the summer heat, alone or with a single 
companion, when life seemed almost too delicious to 
continue; then there would be the return, and a plunge 
into the bathing-pool, and another quiet hour or two 
at the work in hand, and the delight of feeling that 
one was gaining skill and ease of expression; or again 
there would be the quick tramp in winter along muddy 
roads, with the ragged clouds hurrying across the sky, 
with the prospect ahead of a fire-lit evening of study 
and talk; and best of all a walk and a conversation 
with Father Payne himself, when all that he said 
seemed to interpret life afresh and to put it in a new 
and exciting aspect. I never met anyone with such a 
power of linking the loose ends of life together, and 
of giving one so joyful a sense of connection and con- 
tinuance. How it was done I cannot guess; but 
whereas other minds could cast light upon problems, 
Father Payne somehow made light shine through 
them, and gave them a soft translucence. But while 
he managed to give one a great love of life itself, it 
never rested there; he made me feel engaged in some 
sort of eternal business, and though he used no con- 



Characteristics 63 

ventional expressions, I had in his presence a sense of 
vast horizons and shining tracks passing into an 
infinite distance full of glory and sweetness, and of 
death itself as a mystery of surprise and wonder. He 
taught me to look for beauty and harmony, not to 
waste time in mean controversy or in futile regret, but 
to be always moving forwards, and welcoming every 
sign of confidence and goodwill. He had a way, too, 
of making one realize the dignity and necessity of 
work, without cherishing any self-absorbed illusions 
about its impressiveness or its importance. His 
creed was the recognition of all beauty and vividness 
as an unquestionable sign of the presence of God, 
the Power that made for order and health and strength 
and peace; and the deep necessity of growing to under- 
stand one another with unsuspicious trustfulness and 
sympathy — the Fatherhood of God, and the Brother- 
hood of Man, these were the doctrines by which he 
lived. 

It used to be an extraordinary pleasure to me to 
accompany him about the village ; he knew everyone, 
and could talk with a simple directness and a quiet 
humour that was inimitable. I never saw so naturally 
pastoral a man. He carried good-temper about with 
him, and yet he could rebuke with a sharpness which 
surprised me, if there was need. He was curiously 
tolerant, I used to think, of sensual sins, but in the 
presence of cruelty or meanness or deliberate deceit 
he used to explode into the most violent language. I 
remember a scene which it is almost a terror to me 
now to recollect, when I was walking with him, and we 
met a tipsy farmer of a neighbouring village flogging 
his horse along a lane. He ran up beside the cart, 
he stopped the horse, he roared at the farmer, "Get 



64 Father Payne 

out of your cart, you d — d brute, and lead it home. " 
The farmer descended in a state of stupefaction. 
Father Payne snatched the whip out of his hand, broke 
it, threw it over the hedge, threatened him with all 
the terrors of the law, and reduced him to a state of 
abject submission. Presently he recovered somewhat, 
and in drunken wrath began to abuse Father Payne. 
"Very well," said Father Payne, "you can take your 
choice: either you lead the horse home quietly, and 
I'll see it done; or else I come with you to the village, 
and tell the people what I think of you in the open 
street. And if you put up your fist like that again, 
I'll run you home myself and hand you over to the 
policeman. I'll be d — d if I won't do it now. Here 
Duncan, " he said to me, "you go and fetch the police- 
man, and we'll have a little procession back." The 
ruffian thought better of it, and led the horse away 
muttering, while we walked behind until we were near 
the farm. "Now get in, and behave yourself," said 
Father Payne. "And if you choose to come over 
to-morrow and beg my pardon, you may; and if you 
don't, I'll have you up before the magistrates on 
Saturday next." 

I had never seen such wrath; but the tempest sub- 
sided instantly, and he walked back with me in high 
good-humour. The next day the man came over, and 
Father Payne said to me in the evening: "We had 
quite an affecting scene. I gave him a bit of my 
mind, and he thanked me for speaking straight. He's 
a low brute, but I don't think he'll do the same sort of 
thing in a hurry. I'll give him six weeks to get over 
his fright, and then I'll do a little patrolling!" 

His gentleness, on the other hand, with women and 
children was beautiful to see. It was as natural for 



Characteristics 65 

Father Payne to hurry to a scene of disaster or grief 
as it was for others to wish to stay away. He used 
to speak to a sufferer or a mourner with great direct- 
ness. "Tell me all about it," he would say, and he 
would listen with little nods and gestures, raising his 
eyebrows or even shutting his eyes, saying very little, 
except a word or two of sympathy at the end. He 
knew all the children, but he never petted them or 
made favourites, but treated them with a serious kind 
of gravity which he assured us they infinitely preferred. 
He used to have a Christmas entertainment for them 
at the Hall, as well as a summer feast. He encouraged 
the boys and young men to botanize and observe 
nature in all forms, and though he would never allow 
nests to be taken, or even eggs if he could help it, he 
would give little prizes for the noting of any rare bird 
or butterfly. ' ' If you want men to live in the country, 
they must love the country, " he used to say. He kept 
a village club going, but he never went there. "It's 
embarrassing," he used to say. "They don't want 
me strolling in any more than I want them strolling 
in. Philanthropists have no sense of privacy. " He 
did not call at the villagers' houses, unless there was 
some special event, and his talks were confined to 
chance meetings. Neither was there any sense of duty 
about it. "No one is taken in by formal visiting," 
he said. "You must just do it if you like it, or else 
stay away. 'To keep yourself to yourself ' is the 
highest praise these people can give. No one likes a 
fuss!" 

The same sort of principles regulated our own inter- 
course. "We are not monks," he used to say; "we 
are Carthusians, hermits, living together for comfort or 
convenience. " The solitude and privacy of everyone 
5 



66 Father Payne 

was respected. We used to do our talking when we 
took exercise; but there was very little sitting and 
gossipping together tete-a-tele. "I don't want everyone 
to try to be intimate with everyone else," he used 
to say. "The point is just to get on amicably to- 
gether; we won't have any cliques or coteries." He 
himself never came to any of our rooms, but sent a 
message if he wanted to see us. One small thing he 
strongly objected to, the shouting up from the garden 
to anyone's window: " Most offensive ! " He disliked 
all loud shouting and calling or singing aloud. "You 
mustn't use the world as a private sitting-room." 
And the one thing which used to fret him was a voice 
stridently raised. "Don't rouse the echoes!" he 
would say. "You have no more right to make a row 
than you have to use a strong scent or to blow a post- 
horn — that's not liberty! " The result of this was that 
the house was a singularly quiet one, and this sense of 
silence and subdued sound lives in my memory as one 
of its most refreshing characteristics. "A row is 
only pleasant if it is deliberate and organized," he 
used to say. "Native woodnotes wild are all very 
well, but they are not civilization. To talk audibly 
and quietly is the best proof of virtue and honour!" 



XI 

CONVERSATION 

I AM going to try to give a few impressions of talks 
with Father Payne — both public and private talks. 
It is, however, difficult to do this without giving, 
perhaps, a wrong impression. I used to get into the 
habit of jotting down the things he had said, and I 
improved by practice. But he was a rapid talker and 
somewhat discursive, and he was often deflected from 
his main subject by a question or a discussion. Yet 
I do not want it to be thought that he was fond of 
monologue and soliloquy. He was not, I should say, 
a very talkative man; days would sometimes pass 
without his doing more than just taking a hand in 
conversation. He liked to follow the flow of a talk, 
and to contribute a remark now and then; sometimes 
he was markedly silent; but in no case was he ever 
oppressive. Occasionally, and more often in tete-a- 
tete, he went ahead and talked copiously, but this was 
rather the exception than the rule. I have not 
thought it worth while to try to give the effect of our 
own talk. We were young, excitable, and argumenta- 
tive, and, though it was at the time often delightful 
and stimulating, it was also often very crude and 
immature. Father Payne was good at helping a 
talker out, and would often do justice to a clumsily 
expressed remark which he thought was interesting. 
67 



68 Father Payne 

But he was by far the most interesting member of the 
circle; he spoke easily and flowingly when he was 
moved, and there always seemed to me a sense of form 
about his talk which was absent from ours. But 
under no circumstance did he ever become tedious — 
indeed he was extremely sensitive to the smallest 
signs of impatience. We often tried, so to speak, to 
draw him out ; but if he had the smallest suspicion that 
he was being drawn, he became instantly silent. 

There is more coherence about some of the talks 
I have recorded than was actually the case. He 
would diverge to tell a story, or he would call one's 
attention to some sight or sound. 

Moreover his face, his movements, his gestures, all 
added much to his talk. He had a way of wrinkling 
up his brows, of shaking his head, of looking round 
with an awestruck expression, his eyes wide open, his 
mouth pursed up, especially when he had reached some 
triumphantly absurd conclusion. He had two little 
quick gestures of the hands as he spoke, opening his 
fingers, waving a point aside, emphasizing an argu- 
ment by a quick downward motion of his forefinger. 
He had, too, a quick, loud, ebullient laugh, sometimes 
shrill, sometimes deep; and he abandoned himself to 
laughter at an absurd story or jest as completely as 
anyone I have ever seen. Rose was an excellent mimic 
and Father Payne used to fall into agonizing parox- 
ysms of laughter at many of his representations. But 
he always said that laughter was with him a social 
mood, and that he had never any inclination to laugh 
when he was alone. 

So the record of his talks must be taken not as 
typical of his everyday mood, but as instances of the 
kind of things he said when he was moved to speak at 



Conversation 69 

large; and even so they give, I am aware, too con- 
densed an impression. He never talked as if he were 
playing on a party or a companion with a hose-pipe. 
There was never anyone who was more easily silenced 
or diverted. But to anyone who knew him they will 
give, I believe, a true impression of his method of talk; 
and perhaps they may give to those who never saw 
him a faint reflection of his lively and animated mind, 
the energy with which he addressed himself to small 
problems, and the firm belief which he always main- 
tained that any evidence of life, however elementary, 
was more encouraging and inspiring than the most 
elaborate logic or the profoundest intellectual grasp 
of abstract subjects. 



XII 

OF GOING TO CHURCH 

I HAD been to church one summer Sunday morning 
— a very simple affair it was, with nothing sung 
but a couple of hymns; but the Vicar read beautifully, 
neither emphatically nor lifelessly, with a little thrill 
in his voice at times that I liked to hear. It did not 
compel you to listen so much as invite you to join. 
Lestrange played the organ most divinely ; he generally 
extemporized before the service, and played a simple 
piece at the end; but he never strained the resources 
of the little organ, and it was all simple and formal 
music, principally Bach or Handel. 

Father Payne himself was a regular attendant at 
church, and Sunday was a decidedly leisurely day. 
He advised us to put aside our writing work, to write 
letters, read, make personal jottings, talk, though there 
was no inquisition into such things. 

Father Payne was a somewhat irregular responder, 
but it was a pleasure to sit near him, because his deep 
rapid voice gave a new quality to the words. He 
seemed happy in church, and prayed with great 
absorption, though I noticed that his Bible was often 
open before him all through the service. The Vicar's 
sermons were good of their kind, suggestive rather 
than provocative, about very simple matters of con- 
duct rather than belief. I have heard Father Payne 
70 



Of Going to Church 71 

speak of them with admiration as never being dis- 
cursive, and I gathered that the Vicar was a great 
admirer of Newman's sermons. 

We came away together, Father Payne and I, and 
we strolled a little in the garden. I felt emboldened 
to ask him the plain question why he went to church. 
" Oh, for a lot of reasons, " he said, "none of them very 
conclusive! I like to meet my friends in the first 
place; and then a liturgy has a charm for me. It has 
a beauty of its own, and I like ceremony. It is not 
that I think it sacred — only beautiful. But I quite 
admit the weakness of it, which is simply that it does 
not appeal to everyone, and I don't think that our 
Anglican service is an ideal service. It is too refined 
and formal; and many people would feel it was more 
religious if it were more extempore — prayer and plain 
advice." 

I told him something of my old childish experience, 
saying that I used to regard church as a sort of calling- 
over, and that God would be vexed if one did not 
appear. 

He laughed at his. "Yes, I don't think we can 
insist on it as being a levee," he said, "where one is 
expected to come and make one's bow and pay formal 
compliments. That idea is an old anthropomorphic 
one, of course. It is superstitious — it is almost de- 
basing to think of God demanding praise as a duty in- 
cumbent on us. 'To thee all angels cry aloud' — I 
confess I don't like the idea of heaven as a place of 
cheerful noise — that isn't attractive! 

"And also I think that the attention demanded in 
our service is a mistake — it's a mixture of two ideas; 
the liturgical ceremony which touches the eye and the 
emotion, rather than the reason; and the sermon and 



72 Father Payne 

the prayer in which the reason is supposed to be con- 
cerned. I think the Catholic idea is a better one : a 
solemnity performed, in which you don't take part, 
but receive impressions. There's no greater strain 
on the mind than forcing it to follow a rapid and ex- 
alted train of intellectual and literary thought and 
expression. I confess I don't attempt that. It seems 
to me just a joyful and neighbourly business, where one 
puts the mind in a certain expectant mood, and is 
lucky if one carries a single thrill or aspiration away. " 

"What do you do, then?" I said. 

"Well, I meditate," said Father Payne. "I be- 
lieve in meditation very much, and in solitude it is 
very hard work. But the silent company of friends, 
and the old arches and woodwork, some simple music, 
a ceremony, and a little plan of thought going on — 
that seems to me a fruitful atmosphere. Some verse, 
some phrase, which I have heard a hundred times 
before, suddenly seems written in letters of gold. I 
follow it a little way into the dark, I turn it over, I 
wonder about it, I enjoy its beauty. I don't say that 
my thoughts are generally very startling or poignant 
or profound ; but I feel the sense of the Fatherly, toler- 
ant, indulgent presence of God, and a brotherly affec- 
tion for my fellow-men. It's a great thing to be in 
the same place with a number of people, all silent, and 
on the whole thinking quiet, happy, and contented 
thoughts. It all brings me into line with my village 
friends, it gives me a social mood, and I feel for once 
that we all want the same things from life — and that 
for once instead of having to work and push for them, 
we are fed and comforted. 'Open thy mouth wide, 
and I will fill it' — that's a wholesome, childlike verse, 
you know. The whole thing seems to me a simple 



Of Going to Church 73 

device for producing a placid and expectant mood — 
I don't know anything else that produces it so well. " 

"You mean it is something mystical — almost 
hypnotic?" I said. 

"Perhaps I should if I knew what those big words 
meant," said Father Payne, smiling. "No; church 
seems to me a thing that has really grown up out of 
human nature, not a thing imposed upon it. I don't 
like what may be called ecclesiasticism, partly because 
it emphasizes the intellectual side of belief, partly 
because it tries to cast a slur on the people who don't 
like ceremonial, and whom it does not suit — and most 
of all because ecclesiasticism aims at making you 
believe that other people can transact spiritual busi- 
ness on your account. In these democratic days, you 
can't have spiritual authority — you have got to find 
what people need, and help them to find it for them- 
selves. The plain truth is that we don't want dogma. 
Of course it isn't to be despised, because it once meant 
something, even if it does not now. Dogmas are not 
unintelligible intellectual propositions imposed on the 
world. They are explanations, interpretations, at- 
tempts to link facts together. They have the sacred- 
ness of ideas which people lived by, and for which they 
were prepared to die. But many of them are scien- 
tific in form only, and the substance has gone out of 
them. We know more in one sense about life and God 
than we did, but we also know less, because we realize 
there is so much more to know. But now we want, 
I believe, two or three great ideas which everyone can 
understand — like Fatherhood and Brotherhood, like 
peace and orderliness and beauty. I think that a 
church service means all these things, or ought to. 
What people need is simplicity and beauty of life — 



74 Father Payne 

joy and hope and kindness. Anything which helps 
these things on is fine; anything which bewilders and 
puzzles and gives a sense of dreariness is simply 
injurious. I want to be told to be quiet, to try again, 
not to be disheartened by failures, not to be angry 
with other people, to give up things, rather than to 
get them with a sauce of envy and spite— the feeling 
of a happy and affectionate family, in fact. The sort 
of thing I don't want is the Athanasian Creed. I 
can't regard it simply as a picturesque monument of 
ancient and ferocious piety. It seems to me an over- 
hanging cloud of menace and mystification! It 
doesn't hurt the unintelligent Christian, of course — 
he simply doesn't understand it; but to the moder- 
ately intelligent it is like a dog barking furiously 
which may possibly get loose ; a little more intelligence 
and it is all right. You know the dog is safely tied up ! 
Again, I don't mind the cursing psalms, because they 
give the parson the power of saying : ' We say this to 
remind ourselves that it was what people used to feel, 
and which Christ came to change.' I don't mind 
anything that is human — what I can't tolerate is 
anything inhuman or unint lligible. No one can 
misunderstand the Beatitudes; very few people can 
follow the arguments of St. Paul! You don't want 
only elaborate reasons for clever people, you want still 
more beautiful motives for simple people. It isn't 
perfect, our service, I admit, but it 'does me good." 

"Tell me," I said — "to go back for a moment — 
something more about meditating — I like that!" 

"Well," said Father Payne, "it's like anchoring 
to a thought. Thought is a fidgety thing, restless, 
perverse. It anchors itself very easily on to a griev- 
ance, or an unpleasant incident, or a squabble. Don't 



Of Going to Church 75 

you know the misery of being jerked back, time after 
time, by an unpleasant thought? I think one ought 
to practise the opposite — and I know now by experi- 
ence that it is possible. I will make a confession. I 
don't care for many of the Old Testament lessons 
myself. I think there's too much fact, or let us say 
incident, in them, and not enough poetry. Well, I 
take up my Bible, and I look at Job, or Isaiah, or the 
Revelation, and I read quietly on. Suddenly there's 
a gleam of gold in the bed of the stream — some 
splendid, deep, fine thought. I follow it out ; I think 
how it has appeared in my own life, or in the lives of 
other people — it bears me away on its wings. I pray 
about it, I hope to be more like that — and so on. 
Sometimes it is a sharp revela ion of something ugly 
and perverse in my own nature — I don't dwell long 
on that, but I see in imagination how it is likely to 
trouble me, and I hope that it will not delude me again; 
because these evil things delude one, they call noxious 
tricks by fine names. I say to myself, ' What you pre- 
tend is self-respect, or consistency, is really irritable 
vanity or stupid unimaginativeness. ' But it is a 
mistake, I think, to dwell long on one's deficiencies: 
what one has got to do is to fill one's life full of positive, 
active, beautiful things, until there is no room for the 
ugly intruders. And, to put it shortly, a service makes 
me think about other people and about God; I fear 
it doesn't make me contrite or sorrowful. I don't 
believe in any sort of self-pity, nor do I think one 
ought to cultivate shame; those things lie close to 
death, and it is life that I am in search of — fulness 
of life. Don't let us bemoan ourselves, or think that a 
sign of grace!" 

"But if you find yourself grubby, nasty, suspicious, 



76 Father Payne 

irritable, isn't it a good thing to rub it in sometimes?" 
I said. 

"No, no," said Father Payne, "life will do that 
hard enough. Turn your back on it all, look at the 
beautiful things, leave a thief to catch a thief, and the 
dead to bury the dead. Don't sniff at the evil thing; 
go and get a breath of fresh air. " 



XIII 

OF NEWSPAPERS 

FATHER Payne was a very irregular reader of the 
newspaper; he was not greedy of news, and he 
was incurious about events, while he disliked the 
way in which they were professionally dished up for 
human consumption. At times, however, he would 
pore long and earnestly over a daily paper with knitted 
brows and sighs. "You seem to be suffering a good 
deal over your paper to-day, Father!" said Barthrop 
once, regarding him with amusement. Father Payne 
lifted up his head, and then broke into a smile. " It's 
all right, my boy," he said. "I don't despair of the 
world itself, but I feel that if the average newspaper 
represents the mind of the average man, the human 
race is very feeble — not worth saving! This sort of 
thing" — indicating the paper with a wave of his hand 
— "makes me realize how many things there are that 
don't interest me — and I can't get at them either 
through the medium of these writers' minds. They 
don't seem to want simply to describe the facts, but 
to manipulate them; they try to make you uncom- 
fortable about the future, and contented with the past. 
It ought to be just the other way! And then I ask 
myself, 'Ought I, as a normal human being, to be as 
one-sided, as submissive, as trivial, as sentimental as 
this?' These vast summaries of public opinion, do 
77 



78 Father Payne 

they represent any one's opinion at all, or are they 
simply the sort of thing you talk about in a railway 
carriage with a man } t ou don't know? Does any one's 
mind really dwell on such things and ponder them? 
The newspapers do not really know what is happening 
— everything takes them by surprise. The ordinary 
person is interested in his work, his amusements, the 
people he lives with — in real things. There seems to 
be nothing real here; it is all shadowy. I want to 
get at men's minds, not at what journalists think is in 
men's minds. The human being in the newspapers 
seems to me an utterly unreal person, picturesque, 
theatrical, fatuous, slobbering, absurd. Does not the 
newspaper-convention misrepresent us as much as the 
book-convention misrepresents us? We straggle ir- 
regularly along, we are capable of entertaining at the 
same moment two wholly contrary opinions, we do 
what we don't intend to do, we don't carry out our 
hopes or our purposes. The man in the papers is 
agitated, excited, wild, inquisitive — the ordinary 
person is calm, indifferent, and on the whole fairly 
happy, unless someone frightens him. I can't make 
it out, because it isn't a conspiracy to deceive, and 
yet it does deceive; and what is more, most people 
don't even seem to know that they are being misre- 
presented. It all seems to me to differ as much from 
real life as the Morning Service read in church differs 
from the thoughts of the congregation!" 

"How would you mend it?" said Barthrop. "It 
seems to me it must represent something. " 

"Something!" said Father Payne. "I don't know! 
I don't believe we are so stupid and so ignoble! As 
to mending it, that's another question. Writing is 
such a curious thing — it seems to represent anything 



Of Newspapers 79 

in the world except the current of a man's thoughts. 
Reverie — has any one ever tried to represent that ? I 
have been out for a walk sometimes, and reflected 
when I came in that if what has passed through my 
mind were all printed in full in a book, it would make 
a large octavo volume — and precious stuff, too ! Yet 
the few thoughts which do stand out when it is all 
over, the few bright flashes, they are things which can 
hardly be written down — at least they never are 
written down." 

"But what would you do?" I said — "with the 
newspapers, I mean." 

"Well," said Father Payne, "a great deal of the 
news most worth telling can be told best in pictures. 
I believe very much in illustrated papers. They really 
do help the imagination. That's the worst of words — 
a dozen scratches on a bit of paper do more to 
make one realize a scene than columns of description. 
I would do a lot with pictures, and a bit of print below 
to tell people what to notice. Then we must have a 
number of bare facts and notices — weather, business, 
trade, law — the sort of thing that people concerned 
must read. But I would make a clean sweep of 
fashion, and all sensational intelligence — murders, 
accidents, sudden deaths. I would have much more 
biography of living people as well as dead, and a few 
of the big speeches. Then I would have really good 
articles with pictures about foreign countries — we 
ought to know what the world looks like, and how 
the other people live. And then I would have one or 
two really fine little essays every day by the very best 
people I could get, amusing, serious, beautiful articles 
about nature and art and books and ideas and qualities 
— some real, good, plain, wise, fine, simple thinking. 



80 Father Payne 

You want to get people in touch with the best minds !" 

"And how many people would read such a paper?" 
I said. 

"Oh, I don't know, I'm sure," said Father Payne 
with a groan. "I would for one! I want to have 
the feeling of being in touch day by day with the 
clever, interesting, lively, active-minded people, as 
if I had been listening to good talk. Isn't that 
possible? Instead of which I sit here, day after day, 
overflowing with my own ridiculous thoughts — and 
the world discharging all its staleness and stupidity 
like a sewer in these horrible documents. Take it 
away from me someone! I'm fascinated by the dis- 
gusting smell of it ! " I withdrew the paper from under 
his hands. "Thank you," said Father Payne feebly. 
"That's the horror of it — that the world isn't a dull 
place or a sensational place or a nasty place — and 
these papers make me feel it is all three!" 

"I'm sorry you are so low about it, " said Barthrop. 

"Yes, because journalism ought to be the finest 
thing in the world," said Father Payne. "Just 
imagine! The power of talking, without any of 
the inconveniences of personality, to half-a-million 
people." 

"But why doesn't it improve?" said Barthrop. 
"You always say that the public finds out what it 
wants, and will have it." 

"In books, yes!" said Father Payne; "but in daily 
life we are all so damnably afraid of the truth — that's 
what is the matter with us, and it is that which 
journalism caters for. Suppress the truth, pepper it 
up, flavour it, make it appetizing — try to persuade 
people that the world is romantic! — that's the aim of 
the journalist. He flies from the truth, he makes a 



Of Newspapers 81 

foolish tale out of it, he makes people despise the real 
interests of life, he makes us all want to escape from 
life into something that never has been and never will 
be. I loathe romance with all my heart. The way 
of escape is within, and not without. " 

"You had better go for a walk," said Barthrop 
soothingly. 

"I must," said Father Payne. "I'm drunk and 
drugged with unreality. I will go and have a look 
round the farm — no, I won't have any company, 
thank you. I shall only go on fuming and stewing, 
if I have sympathetic listeners. You are too amiable, 
you fellows. You encourage me to talk, when you 
ought to stop your ears and run from me." And 
Father Payne swung out of the room. 
o 



XIV 

OF HATE 

IT was at dinner, one frosty winter evening, and we 
were all in good spirits. Two or three animated 
conversations were going on at the table. Father 
Payne was telling one of his dreams to the three who 
were nearest to him, and, funny as most of his dreams 
were, this was unusually so. There was a burst of 
laughter and a silence — a sudden sharp silence, in 
which Vincent, who was continuing a conversation, 
was heard to say to Barthrop, in a tone of fierce 
vindictiveness, " I hate him like the devil!" Another 
laugh followed, and Vincent blushed. "Perhaps I 
ought not to say that?" he said in hurried tones. 

"You are quite right," said Father Payne to Vin- 
cent, encouragingly — "at least you may be quite 
right. I don't know of whom you were speaking." 

"Yes, who is it, Vincent?" said someone, leaning 
forwards. 

"No, no," said Father Payne, "that's not fair! 
It was meant to be a private confession. " 

"But you don't hate people, Father?" said Le- 
strange, looking rather pained. 

"I, dear man?" said Father Payne. "Yes, of 
course I do! I loathe them! Where are your eyes 
and ears? All decent people do. How would the 
world get on without it?" 
82 



Of Hate 83 

Lestrange looked rather shocked. "I don't under- 
stand," he said. "I always gathered that you 
thought it our business to — well, to love people." 

"Our business, yes!" said Father Payne; "but our 
pleasure, no! One must begin by hating people. 
What is there to like about many of us? " 

"Why, Father," said Vincent, "you are the most 
charitable of men!" 

Father Payne gave him a little bow. "Come," he 
said, "I will make a confession. I am by nature the 
most suspicious of mankind. I have all the uncivilized 
instincts. There are people of whom I hate the sight 
and the sound, and even the scent. My natural 
impulse is to see the worst points of everyone. I ad- 
mit that people generally improve upon acquaintance, 
but I have no weak sentiment about my fellowmen 
— they are often ugly, stupid, ill-mannered, ill- 
tempered, unpleasant, unkind, selfish. It is a positive 
delight sometimes to watch a thoroughly nasty person, 
and to reflect how much one detests him. It is a 
sign of grace to do so. How otherwise should one 
learn to hate oneself? If you hate nobody, what 
reason is there for trying to improve ? It is impossible 
to realize how nasty you yourself can be until you have 
seen other people being nasty. Then you say to your- 
self, ' Come, that is the kind of thing that I do. Can 
I really be like that ? '" 

"But surely," said Lestrange, "if you do not try 
to love people, you cannot do anything for them; 
you cannot wish them to be different. " 

"Why not?" said Father Payne, laughing. "You 
may hate them so much that you may wish them to be 
different. That is the sound way to begin. I say 
to myself, ' Here is a truly dreadful person ! I would 



84 Father Payne 

abolish and obliterate him if I could; but as I cannot, 
I must try to get him out of this mess, that we may 
live more at ease. ' It is simple humbug to pretend 
to like everyone. You may not think it is entirely 
people's fault that they are so unpleasant; but if you 
really love fine and beautiful things, you must hate 
mean and ugly things. Don't let there be any mis- 
understanding, " he said, smiling round the table. " I 
have hated most of you at different times, some of you 
very much. I don't deny there are good points about 
you, but that isn't enough. Sometimes you are 
detestable!" 

"I see what you mean," said Barthrop; "but 
you don't hate people — you only hate things in them 
and about them. It is just a selection. " 

"Not at all," said Father Payne. "How are you 
going to separate people's qualities and attributes 
from themselves? It is a process of addition and 
subtraction, if you like. There may be a balance in 
your favour. But when a bad mood is on, when a 
person is bilious, fractious, ugly, cross, you hate him. 
It is natural to do so, and it is right to do so. I do 
loathe this talk of mild, weak, universal love. The 
only chance of human beings getting on at all, or 
improving at all, is that they should detest what is 
detestable, as they abominate a bad smell. The only 
reason why we are clean is because we have gradually 
learnt to hate bad smells. A bad smell means some- 
thing dangerous in the background — so do ugliness, 
ill-health, bad temper, vanity, greediness, stupidity, 
meanness. They are all danger signals. We have no 
business to ignore them, or to forget them, or to make 
allowances for them. They are all part of the beastli- 
ness of the world. " 



Of Hate 85 

"But if we believe in God, and in God's goodness 
— if He does not hate anything which He has made," 
said Lestrange rather ruefully, "ought we not to 
try to do the same?" 

"My dear Lestrange," said Father Payne, "one 
would think you were teaching a Sunday-school class ! 
How do you know that God made the nasty things? 
One must not think so ill of Him as that! It is 
better to think of God as feeble and inefficient, than 
to make Him responsible for all the filth and ugliness 
of the world. He hates them as much as you do, 
you may be sure of that — and is as anxious as you are, 
and a great deal more anxious, to get rid of them. God 
is infinitely more concerned about it, much more 
disappointed about it, than you or me. Why, you 
and I are often taken in. We don't always know 
when things are rotten. I have made friends before 
now with people who seemed charming, and I have 
found out that I was wrong. But I do not think that 
God is taken in. It is a very mixed affair, of course, 
but one thing is clear, that something very filthy is 
discharging itself into the world, like a sewer into a 
river. I am not going to credit God with that; He 
is trying to get rid of it, you may be sure, and He 
cannot do it as fast as He would like. We have got 
to sympathize with Him, and we have got to help 
Him. Come, someone else must talk — I must get 
on with my dinner." Father Payne addressed him- 
self to his plate with obvious appetite. 

"It is all my fault," said Vincent, "but I am not 
going to tell you whom I meant, and Barthrop must 
not. But I will tell you how it was. I was with this 
man, who is an old acquaintance of mine. I used to 
know him when I was living in London. I met him 



86 Father Payne 

the other day, and he asked me to luncheon. He was 
pleasant enough, but after lunch he said to me that 
he was going to take the privilege of an old friend, and 
give me some advice. He began by paying me com- 
pliments; he said that he had thought a year ago that 
I was really going to do something in literature. ' You 
had made a little place for yourself, ' he said ; ' you had 
got your foot on the ladder. You knew the right 
people. You had a real chance of success. Then, 
in the middle of it all, you go and bury yourself in the 
country with an old' — no, I can't say it." 

"Don't mind me!" said Father Payne. 

"Very well," said Vincent, "if you will hear it — 
'with an old humbug, and a set of asses. You sit 
in each other's pockets, you praise each other's stuff, 
you lead what you call the simple life. Where will 
you all be five years hence?' I told him that I didn't 
know, and I didn't care. Then he lost his temper, and 
what was worse, he thought he was keeping it. ' Very 
well,' he said. 'Now I will tell you what you ought 
to be doing. You ought to have buckled to your work, 
pushed yourself quietly in all directions, never have 
written anything, or made a friend, or accepted an 
invitation, without saying, "Will this add to my con- 
sequence?" We must all nurse our reputations in 
this world. They don't come of themselves — they 
have to be made!' Well, I thought this all very 
sickening, and I said I didn't care a d — n about my 
reputation. I said I had a chance of living with 
people whom I liked, and of working at things I 
cared about, and I thought his theories simply dis- 
gusting and vulgar. He showed his teeth at that, 
and said that he had spoken as a true friend, and 
that it had been a painful task; and then I said I 



Of Hate 87 

was much obliged to him, and came away. That's 
the story!" 

"That's all right," said Father Payne, "and ^1 
am much obliged to you for the sidelight on my 
character. But there is something in what he said, 
you know. You are rather unpractical! I shall 
send you back for a bit to London, I think!" 

"Why on earth do you say that?" said Vincent, 
looking a little crestfallen. 

"Because you mind it too much, my boy," said 
Father Payne. "You must not get soft. That's 
the danger of this life! It's all very well for me; I'm 
tough, and I'm moderately rich. But you would not 
have cared so much if you had not thought there was 
something in what he said. It was very low, no doubt, 
and I give you leave to hate him; though, if you are 
going to lead the detached life, you must be detached. 
But now I have caught you up — and we will go back 
a little. The mistake you made, Vincent, if I may 
say so, was to be angry. You may hate people, but 
you must not show that you hate them. That is the 
practical side of the principle. The moment you begin 
to squabble, and to say wounding things, and to try 
to hurt the person you hate, you are simply putting 
yourself on his level. And you must not be shocked 
or pained either. That is worse still, because it makes 
you superior, without making you engaging." 

"Then what are you to do?" said Barthrop. 

"Try persuasion if you like," said Father Payne, 
"but you had better fall back on attractive virtue! 
You must ignore the nastiness, and give the pleasant 
qualities if there are any, room to manoeuvre. 
But I admit it is a difficult job, and needs some 
practice." 



88 Father Payne 

* "But I don't see any principle about it," said 
Vincent. 

"There isn't any," said Father Payne; — "at least 
there is, but you must not dig it in. You mustn't 
use principles as if they were bayonets. Civility is 
the best medium. If you appear to be fatuously 
unconscious of other people's presence, of course they 
want to make themselves felt. But if you are good- 
humoured and polite, they will try to make you think 
well of them. That is probably why your friend calls 
me a humbug — he thinks I can't feel as polite as I 
seem. " 

"But if you are dealing with a real egotist," said 
Vincent, "what are you to do then?" 

"Keep the talk firmly on himself," said Father 
Payne, "and, if he ever strays from the subject, ask 
him a question about himself. Egotists are generally 
clever people, and no clever people like being drawn 
out, while no egotists like to be perceived to be egotists. 
You know the old saying that a bore is a person who 
wants to talk about himself when you want to talk 
about yourself. It is the pull against him that makes 
the bore want to hold his own. The first duty of the 
evangelist is to learn to pay compliments unobtru- 
sively. " 

"That's rather a nauseous prescription!" said 
Lestrange, making a face. 

"Well, you can begin with that," said Father 
Payne, "and when I see you perfect in it, I will tell 
you something else. Let's have some music, and let 
me get the taste of all this high talk out of my mouth ! " 



XV 

OF WRITING 

THERE were certain days when Father Payne 
would hurry in to meals late and abstracted, 
with a cloudy eye, that, as he ate, was fixed on a point 
about a yard in front of him, or possibly about two 
miles away. He gave vague or foolish replies to 
questions, he hastened away again, having heard 
voices but seen no one. I doubt if he could have 
certainly named any one in the room afterwards. 

I had a little question of business to ask him on one 
such occasion after breakfast. I slipped out, but 
two minutes after him, went to his study, and knocked. 
An obscure sound came from within. He was seated 
on his chair, bending over his writing-table. 

"May I ask you something?" I said. 

"Damnation!" said Father Payne. 

I apologized, and tried to withdraw on tiptoe, but 
he said, turning half round, somewhat impatiently, 
"Oh, come in, come in — it's all right. What do you 
want?" 

"I don't want to disturb you," I said. 

"Come in, I tell you!" he said, adding, "you may 
just as well, because I have nothing to do for a quarter 
of an hour." He threw a pen on the table. "It's 
one of my very few penances. If I swear when I am 
at work, I do no work for a quarter of an hour; so 
89 



90 Father Payne 

you can keep me company. Sit down there!" He 
indicated a chair with his large foot, and I sat down. 

My question was soon asked and sooner answered. 
Father Payne beamed upon me with an indulgent air, 
and I said: " May I ask what you were doing?" 

"You may," he said. "I rejoice to talk about it. 
It's my novel. " 

"Your novel!" I said. "I didn't know you wrote 
novels. What sort of a book is it?" 

"It's wretched," he said, "it's horrible, it's gro- 
tesque! It's more like all other novels than any book 
I know. It's written in the most abominable style; 
there isn't a single good point about it. The incidents 
are all hackneyed, there isn't a single lifelike character 
in it, or a single good description, or a single remark 
worth making. I should think it's the worst book ever 
written. Will you hear a bit of it? Do, now! only 
a short bit. I should love to read it to you. " 

"Yes, of course, " I said, "there is nothing I should 
like better. " 

He read a passage. It was very bad indeed. I 
couldn't have imagined that an able man could have 
written such stuff. I had an awful feeling that I had 
heard every word before. 

"There, " he said at last, "that's rather a favourable 
specimen. What do you think of it? Come, out 
with it." 

"I'm afraid I'm not very much of a judge," I 
said. 

His face fell. "That's what everyone says," he 
said. "I know what you mean. But I'll publish 
it — I'll be d — d if I won't! Oh, dash it, that's five 
minutes more. No — I wasn't working, was I? Just 
conversing. " _ 



Of Writing 91 

"But why do you write it, if you are so dissatisfied 
with it?" I said feebly. 

"Why?" he said in aloud voice. "Why? Because 
I love it. I'm besotted by it. It's like strong drink 
to me. I doubt if there's a man in England who 
enjoys himself more than I do when I'm writing. The 
worst of it is, that it won't come out — it's beautiful 
enough when I think of it, but I can't get it down. 
It's my second novel, mind you, and I have got plans 
for three more. Do you suppose I'm going to sit here, 
with all you fellows enjoying yourselves, and not have 
my bit of fun? But it's hopeless, and I ought to be 
ashamed of myself. There simply isn't anything in 
the world that I should not be better employed in 
doing than in scribbling this stuff. I know that; 
but all the authors I know say that writing a book is 
the part they enjoy — they don't care about correcting 
proofs, or publishing, or seeing reviews, or being paid 
for it. Very disinterested and noble, of course ! Now 
I should enjoy it all through, but I simply daren't 
publish my last one — I should be hooted in the village 
when the reviews appeared. But I am going to have 
my fun — the act of creation, you know! But it's 
too late to begin, and I have had no training. The 
beastly thing is as sticky as treacle. It's a sort of 
vomit of all the novels I have ever read, and that's 
the truth!" 

"I simply don't understand," I said. "I have 
heard you criticize books, I have heard you criticize 
some of our work — you have criticized mine. I think 
you one of the best critics I ever heard. You seem 
to know exactly how it ought to be done. " 

"Yes," he said, frowning, "I believe I do. That's 
just it! I'm a critic, pure and simple. I can't look 



92 Father Payne 

at anything, from a pigsty to a cathedral, or listen 
to anything, from a bird singing to an orchestra, or 
read anything, from Bradshaw to Shakespeare, without 
seeing when it is out of shape and how it ought to be 
done. I'm like the man in Ezekiel, whose appearance 
was like the appearance of brass, with a line of flax 
in his hand and a measuring reed. He goes on measur- 
ing everything for about five chapters, and nothing 
comes of it, as far as I can remember! I suppose I 
ought to be content with that, but I can't bear it. 
I hate fault-finding. I want to make beautiful things. 
I spent months over my last novel, and, as Aaron said 
to Moses, 'There came out this calf!' I'm a very 
unfortunate man. If I had not had to work so hard 
for many years for a bare living, I could have done 
something with writing, I think. But now I'm a sort 
of plumber, mending holes in other people's work. 
Nevermind. I will waste my time ! " 

All this while he was eyeing the little clock on his 
table. "Now be off!" he said suddenly. "My 
penance is over, and I won't be disturbed!" He 
caught up his pen. "You had better tell the others 
not to come near me, or I'm blessed if I won't read 
the whole thing aloud after dinner!" And he was 
immersed in his work again. 

Two or three days later I found Father Payne 
strolling in the garden, on a bright morning. It was 
just on the verge of spring. There were catkins in 
the shrubbery. The lilacs were all knobbed with green. 
The aconite was in full bloom under the trees, and the 
soil was all pricked with little green blades. He was 
drinking it all in with delighted glances. I said 
something about his book. 

"Oh, the fit's off!" said he; "I'm sober again! I 



Of Writing 93 

finished the chapter, and, by Jove, I think it's the 
worst thing I have done yet. It's simply infamous! 
I read it with strong sensations of nausea! I really 
don't know how I can get such deplorable rubbish 
down on paper. No matter, I get all the rapture of 
creation, and that's the best part of it. I simply 
couldn't live without it. It clears off some perilous 
stuff or other, and now I feel like a convalescent. Did 
you ever see anything so enchanting as that aconite? 
The colour of it, and the way the little round head is 
tucked down on the leaves! I could improve on it a 
trifle, but not much. God must have had a delicious 
time designing flowers — I wonder why He gave up 
doing it, and left it to the market-gardeners. I can't 
make out why new flowers don't keep appearing. I 
could offer a few suggestions. I dream of flowers 
sometimes — 'great banks of bloom rising up out of 
crystal rivers, in deep gorges, full of sunshine and 
scent. How nice it is to be idle ! I'm sure I've earned 
it, after that deplorable chapter. It really is a miracle 
of flatness! You go back to your work, my boy, and 
thank God you can say what you mean! And then 
you can bring it to me, and I'll tell you to an inch what 
it is worth!" 



XVI 

OF MARRIAGE 

WE were all at dinner one day, and Father Payne 
came in, in an excited mood, with a letter in 
his hand. "Here's a bit of nonsense," he said. 
"Here's my old friend Davenport giving me what he 
calls a piece of his mind — he can't have much left — 
about my 'celibate brotherhood,' as he calls it. It's 
all the other way! I am rather relieved when I hear 
that any of you people are happily engaged to be 
married. Celibacy is the danger of my experiment, 
not the object of it. " 

"Do you wish us to be married?" said Kaye. 
" That's new to me. I thought this was a little fortress 
against the eternal feminine. " 

"What rubbish!" said Father Payne. "The worst 
of using ridiculous words like feminine is that it blinds 
people to the truth. Masculine and feminine have 
nothing to do with sex. In the first place, intellectual 
people are all rather apt to be sexless ; in the next place, 
all sensible people, men and women alike, are what is 
meant by masculine — that is to say, spirited, generous, 
tolerant, good-natured, frank. Thirdly, all suspicious, 
scheming, sensitive, theatrical, irritable, vain people 
are what is meant by feminine. And artistic natures 
are all prone to those failings, because they desire 
dignity and influence — they want to be felt. The 
94 



Of Marriage 95 

real difference between people is whether they want to 
live, or whether they want to be known to exist. The 
worst of feminine people is that they are probably 
the people who ought not to marry, unless they marry 
a masculine person; and they are not, as a rule, at- 
tracted by masculinity." 

"But one can't get married in cold blood," said 
Vincent. "I often wish that marriages could just 
be arranged, as they do it in France. I think I 
should be a very good husband, but I shall never have 
the courage or the time to go in search of a wife." 

"That's why I send you all out into the world," 
said Father Payne. "Most people ought to be mar- 
ried. It's a normal thing — it isn't a transcendental 
thing. In my experience most marriages are success- 
ful. It does everyone good to be obliged to live at 
close quarters with other people, and to be unable to 
get away from them. " 

" I didn't know you were interested in such matters," 
said someone. 

"I have gone into it pretty considerably, sir," said 
Father Payne. "The one thing that does interest me 
is human admixtures. It does no one any good to get 
too much attached to his own point of view. " 

" But surely, " said Rose, "there are some marriages 
which are obviously bad for all concerned — real in- 
compatibilities? People who can't understand each 
other or their children — children who can't understand 
their parents? It always seems to me rather horrible 
that people should be shut up together like rats in a 
cage." 

"I expect we shall have legislation before long," 
said Father Payne, "for breaking up homes where 
some definite evil like drunkenness is at work — but 



96 Father Payne 

I don't want industrial schools for children; that is 
even more inhuman than a bad home. We want 
more boarding out, but that's expensive. Someone 
has to pay, if children are to be planted out, and to 
pay well. There's no motive of duty so strong for an 
Englishman as good wages. People are honest about 
giving fair money's worth. But it is no good talking 
about these things, because they are all so far ahead 
of us. The question is whether any one can suggest 
any practical means of filing away any of the rough- 
nesses of marriage. I do not believe that the problem 
is very serious among workers. It is the marriage of 
idle people that is apt to be disastrous. " 

"The thing that damages many marriages," said 
Rose, "is the fact that people have got to see so much 
of each other. What people really want is a holiday 
from each other." 

"Yes, but that is impossible financially," said 
Father Payne. "Apart from love and children, 
marriage is a small joint-stock company for cheap 
comfort. But it is of no use to go vapouring on about 
these big schemes, because in a democracy people 
won't do what philosophers wish, but what they want. 
Let's take a notorious case, known to everyone. Can 
any one say what practical advice he could have given 
to either Carlyle or to Mrs. Carlyle, which would have 
improved that witches' cauldron? There were two 
high-principled Puritanical people, which is the same 
thing as saying that they both were disposed to con- 
sider that any one who disagreed with them did so for 
a bad motive, and exalted their own whims and 
prejudices into moral principles; both of them irrita- 
ble and sensitive, both able to give instantaneous and 
elaborate expression to their vaguest thoughts, — 



Of Marriage 97 

Carlyle himself with eloquence which he wielded like 
a bludgeon, and Mrs. Carlyle with incisiveness which 
she used like a sharp knife — Carlyle with too much to 
do, and Mrs. Carlyle with less than nothing to do — 
each passionately attached to the other as soon as they 
were separated, and both capable of saying the sweet- 
est and most affectionate things by letter, which they 
could not for the life of them utter in talk. They did, 
as a matter of fact, spend an immense amount of time 
apart; and when they were together, Carlyle, having 
been trained as a peasant and one of a large family, 
roughly neglected Mrs. Carlyle, while Mrs. Carlyle, 
with a middle-class training, and moreover indulged 
as an only daughter, was too proud to complain, but 
not proud enough not to resent the neglect deeply. 
What could have been done for them? Were they 
impossible people to live with? Was it true, as Tenny- 
son bluntly said, that it was as well that they married, 
because two people were unhappy instead of four?" 

"They wanted a child as a go-between!" said 
Barthrop. 

"Of course they did!" said Father Payne. "That 
would have pulled the whole menage together. And 
don't tell me that it was a wise dispensation that they 
were childless! Cleansing fires? The fires in which 
they lived, with Carlyle raging about porridge and 
milk and crowing cocks, working alone, walking alone, 
flying off to see Lady Ash burton, sleeping alone; 
and Mrs. Carlyle, whom everyone else admired and 
adored, eating her heart out because she could not 
get him to value her company; — there was not much 
that was cleansing about all that! The cleansing 
came when she was dead, and when he saw what he 
had done." 



98 Father Payne 

"I expect they have made it up by now, " said Kaye. 

"You're quite right!" said Father Payne. "It 
matters less with those great vivid people. They 
can afford to remember. But the little people, who 
simply end farther back than they began, what is to 
be done for them?" 



XVII 

OF LOVING GOD 

FATHER Payne suddenly said to me once in a loud 
voice, after a long silence — we were walking 
together — "Writers, preachers, moralists, sentimen- 
talists, are much to blame for not explaining more 
what they mean by loving God — perhaps they do 
not know! Love is so large a word, and covers so 
great a range of feelings. What sort of love are we 
to give God — the love of the lover, or the son, or the 
daughter, or the friend, or the patriot, or the dog? 
Is it to be passion, or admiration, or reverence, or 
fidelity, or pity? All of these enter into love." 

"What do you think yourself? " I said. 

"How am I to tell?" said Father Payne. "I am 
in many minds about it — it cannot be passion, because, 
whatever one may say, something of physical satis- 
faction is mingled with that. It cannot be a dumb 
fidelity — that is irrational. It cannot be an equal 
friendship, because there is no equality possible. It 
cannot be that of the child for the mother, because the 
mind is hardly concerned in that. Can one indeed 
love the Unknown? Again, it cannot be all receiving 
and no giving. We must have something to give God 
which He desires to have and which we can withhold. 
To say that the answer is, ' My son, give Me thy heart,' 
begs the question, because the one thing certain about 
99 



ioo "" Father Payne 

love is that we cannot give it to whom we will — it 
must be evoked; and even if it is wanted, we cannot 
always give it. We may respect and reverence a 
person very much, but, as Charlotte Bronte said, 
' our veins may run ice whenever we are near him. ' 

"And then, too, can we love any one who knows 
us perfectly, through and through? Is it not of the 
essence of love to be blind? Is it possible for us to 
feel that we are worthy of the love of any one who really 
knows us? 

"And then, too, if disaster and suffering and cruel 
usage and terror come from God, without reference 
to the sensitiveness of the soul and body on which 
they fall, can we possibly love the Power which 
behaves so? What child could love a father who 
might at any time strike him? I cannot believe that 
God wants an unquestioning and fatuous trust, and 
still less the sort of deference we pay to one who may 
do us a mischief if we do not cringe before him. All 
that is utterly unworthy of the mind and soul. " 

"Is it not possible to believe," I said, "that all 
experience may be good for us, however harsh it 
seems?" 

"No rational man can think that," said Father 
Payne. "Suffering is not good for people if it is 
severe and protracted. I have seen many natures 
go utterly to pieces under it. " 

"What do you believe, then?" I said. 

"Of course the only obvious explanation," said 
Father Payne, "is that suffering, misery, evil, disaster, 
disease, do not come from God at all ; that He is the 
giver of health and joy and light and happiness; that 
He gives us all He can, and spares us all He can; but 
that there is a great enemy in the world, whom He 



Of Loving God 101 

cannot instantly conquer ; that He is doing all He can 
to shield us, and to repair the harm that befalls us — 
that we can make common cause with Him, and pity 
Him for His thwarted plans, His endless disappoint- 
ments, His innumerable failures, His grievous suffer- 
ings. It would be easy to love God if He were like 
that — yet who dares to say it or to teach it? It is 
the dreadful doctrine of His Omnipotence that ruins 
everything. I cannot hold any communication with 
Omnipotence — it is a consuming fire; but if I could 
know that God was strong and patient and diligent, 
but not all-powerful or all-knowing, then I could 
commune with Him. If, when some evil mishap over- 
takes me, I could say to Him, 'Come, help me, con- 
sole me, show me how to mend this, give me all the 
comfort you can, ' then I could turn to Him in love 
and trust, so long as I could feel that He did not wish 
the disaster to happen to me but could not ward it off, 
and was as miserable as myself that it had happened. 
Not so miserable, of course, because He has waited so 
long, suffered so much, and can discern so bright and 
distant a hope. Then, too, I might feel that death 
was perhaps our escape from many kinds of evil, and 
that I should be clasped to His heart for awhile, even 
though He sent me out again to fight His battles. 
That would evoke all my love and energy and courage, 
because I could feel that I could give Him my help; 
but if He is Almighty, and could have avoided all the 
sorrow and pain, then I am simply bewildered and 
frightened, because I can predicate nothing about 
Him." 

"Is not that the idea which Christianity aims at?" 
I said. 

"Yes," he said; "the suffering Saviour, who can 



102 Father Payne 

resist evil and amend it, but cannot instantly subdue 
it; but, even so, it seems to set up two Gods for one. 
The mind cannot really identify the Saviour with the 
Almighty Designer of the Universe. But the thought 
of the Saviour does interpret the sense of God's 
failure and suffering, does bring it all nearer to the 
heart. But if there is Omnipotence behind, it all falls 
to the ground again — at least it does for me. I cannot 
pray to Omnipotence and Omniscience, because it is 
useless to do so. The limited and the unlimited can- 
not join hands. I must, if I am to believe in God, 
believe in Him as a warrior arriving on a scene of 
disorder, and trying to make all well. He must not 
have permitted the disorder to grow up, and then try 
to subdue it. It must be there first. It is a battle 
obviously — but it must be a real battle against a real 
foe, not a sham fight between hosts created by God. 
In that case, 'to think of oneself as an instrument of 
God's designs is a privilege one shares with the devil, ' 
as someone said. I will not believe that He is so 
little in earnest as that. No, He is the great invader, 
who desires to turn darkness to light, rage to peace, 
misery to happiness. Then, and only then, can I 
enlist under His banner, fight for Him, honour Him, 
worship Him, compassionate Him, and even love Him; 
but if He is in any way responsible for evil, by design 
or by neglect, then I am lost indeed!" 



XVIII 

OF FRIENDSHIP 

" j_J E is the sort of man who is always losing his 

1 1 friends," said Pollard at dinner to Father 
Payne, describing someone, "and I always think that's 
a bad sign. " 

"And I, on the contrary," said Father Payne, 
"think that a man who always keeps his friends is 
almost always an ass!" He opened his mouth and 
drew in his breath. 

"Or else it means," said Barthrop, "that he has 
never really made any friends at all!" 

"Quite right," said Father Payne. "People talk 
about friendship as if it was a perfectly normal thing, 
like eating and drinking — it's not that ! It's a difficult 
thing, and it is a rare thing. I do not mean mere 
proximities and easy comradeships and muddled 
alliances; there are plenty of frank and pleasant com- 
panionships about of a solid kind. Still less do I mean 
the sort of thing which is contained in such an expres- 
sion as 'Dear old boy!' which is always a half-con- 
temptuous phrase." 

"But isn't loyalty a fine quality?" said Lestrange. 

"Loyalty!" said Father Payne. "Of course you 

must play fair, and be ready to stick by a man, and do 

him a kindness, and help him up if he has a fall; but 

that is not friendship — at least it isn't what I mean by 

103 



104 Father Payne 

friendship. Friendship is a sort of passion, without 
anything sexual or reproductive about it. There is a 
physical basis about it, of course. I mean there are 
certain quite admirable, straightforward, pleasant 
people, whom you may meet and like, and yet with 
whom you could never be friends, though they may 
be quite capable of friendship, and have friends of 
their own. A man's presence and his views and emo- 
tions must be in some sort of tune with your own. 
There are certain people, not in the least repellent, 
genial, kindly, handsome, excellent in every way, with 
whom you simply are not comfortable. On the other 
hand, there are people of no great obvious attractive- 
ness with whom you feel instantaneously at ease. 
There is something mysterious about it, some currents 
that don't mix, and some that do. A thousand years 
hence we shall probably know something about it we 
don't now." 

"I feel that very strongly about books," said 
Kaye. "There are certain authors, who have skill, 
charm, fancy, invention, style — all the things you 
value — who yet leave you absolutely cold. They have 
every qualification for pleasing except the power 
to please. It is simply a case of Dr. Fell! You 
can't give a single valid reason why you don't like 
them. " 

"Yes, indeed," said Father Payne. "And then, 
again, there are authors whom you like at a certain 
age and under certain circumstances, and who end 
by boring you; and again, authors whom you don't 
like when you are young, and like better when you are 
old. Does your idea of loyalty apply also to books, 
Lestrange, or to music?" 

"No," said Lestrange, "to be frank, it does not; 



Of Friendship 105 

but I think that is different — a lot of technical things 
come in, and then one's taste alters." 

"And that is just the same with people," said 
Father Payne. "Why, what does loyalty mean in 
such a connection? You have admired a book or a 
piece of music ; you cease to admire it. Are you to go 
on saying you admire it, or to pretend to yourself that 
you admire it? Of course not — that is simply hy- 
pocrisy — there is nothing real about that." 

"But what are you to do," said Vincent, "about 
people? You can't treat them like books or music. 
You need not go on reading a book which you have 
ceased to admire. But what if you have made a friend, 
and then ceased to care for him, and he goes on caring 
for you? Are you to throw him over?" 

"I admit that there is a difficulty," said Father 
Payne; "I agree that you must not disappoint people; 
but it is also somehow your duty to get out of a rela- 
tion that is no longer a real one. It can't be whole- 
some to simulate emotions for the sake of loyalty. 
It must all depend upon which you think the finer 
thing — the emotion or the tie. Personally, I think 
the emotion is the more sacred of the two. " 

"But does it not mean that you have made a mis- 
take somehow," said Vincent, "if you have made a 
friend, and then cease to care about him?" 

"Not a bit," said Father Payne. "Why, people 
change very much, and some people change faster 
than others. A man may be exactly what you want 
at a certain time of life; he may be ahead of you in 
ideas, in qualities, in emotions; and what starts a 
friendship is the perception of something fine and 
desirable in another, which you admire and want to 
imitate. But then you may outstrip your friend. 



106 Father Payne 

Take the case of an artist. He may have an ad- 
miration for another artist, and gain much from 
him; but then he may go right ahead of him. He 
can't go on admiring and deferring out of mere 
loyalty." 

"But must there not be in every real friendship a 
purpose of continuance?" said Vincent. "It surely 
is a very selfish sort of business, if you say to yourself, 
'I will make friends with this man because I admire 
him now, but when I have got all I can out of him, 
I will discard him.' " 

" Of course, you must not think in that cold-blooded 
way," said Father Payne, "but it can never be more 
than a hope of continuance. You may hope to find 
a friendship a continuous and far-reaching thing. 
It may be quite right to get to know a man, believing 
him to have fine qualities; but you can't pledge your- 
self to admire whatever you find in him. We have 
to try experiments in friendship as in everything else. 
It is purely sentimental to say, ' I am going to believe 
in this man blindfold, whatever I find him to be.' 
That's a rash vow! You must not take rash vows; 
and if you do, you must be prepared to break them. 
Besides, you can't depend upon your friend not alter- 
ing. He may lose some of the very things you most 
admire. The mistake is to believe that anything can 
be consistent or permanent." 

"But if you don't believe that," said Lestrange, 
"are you justified in entering upon intimate relations 
at all?" 

"Of course you are," said Father Payne; "you 
can't live life on prudent lines. You can't say, 'I 
won't engage in life, or take a hand in it, or believe 
in it, or love it, till I know more about it. ' You can't 



Of Friendship 107 

foresee all contingencies and risks. You must take 
risks. " 

"I expect," said Barthrop, "that we are meaning 
different things by friendship. Let us define our 
terms. What do you mean by friendship, Father?" 

"Well," said Father Payne, "I will tell you if I 
can. I mean a consciousness, which generally comes 
rather suddenly, of the charm of a particular person. 
You have a sudden curiosity about him. You want 
to know what his ideas, motives, views of life are. It 
is not by any means always that you think he feels about 
things as you do yourself. It is often the difference 
in him which attracts you. But you like his manner, 
his demeanour, his handling of life. What he says, 
his looks, his gestures, his personality, affect you in a 
curious way. And at the same time you seem to dis- 
cern a corresponding curiosity in him about yourself. 
It is a pleasurable surprise both to discover that he 
agrees with you, and also that he disagrees with you. 
There is a beauty, a mystery, about it all. Generally 
you think it rather surprising that he should find 
you interesting. You wish to please him and to 
satisfy his expectations. That is the dangerous part 
of friendship, that two people in this condition make 
efforts, sacrifices, suppressions, in order to be liked. 
Even if you disagree, you both give hints that you are 
prepared to be converted. There is a sudden increase 
of richness in life, the sense of a moving current whose 
impulse you feel. You meet, you talk, you find a 
freshness of feeling, light cast upon dark things, a new 
range of ideas vividly present." 

"But isn't all that rather intellectual?" said Vincent, 
who had been growing restive. "The thing can surely 
be much simpler than that?" 



io8 Father Payne 

"Yes, of course it can, " said Father Payne, "among 
simple people — but we are all complicated people 
here." 

" Yes, " said Vincent, "we are! But isn't it possible 
for an intellectual man to feel a real friendship for a 
quite unintellectual man — not a desire to discuss 
everything with him, but a simple admiration for 
fine frank qualities?" 

"Oh yes," said Father Payne, "there can be all 
sorts of alliances; but I am not speaking of them. 
I am speaking of a sort of mutual understanding. 
In friendship, as I understand it, the two must not 
speak different languages. They must be able to 
put their minds fairly together — there can be a kind 
of man-and-dog friendship, of course, but that is more 
a sort of love and trust. Now in friendship people 
must be mutually intelligible. It need not be equal- 
ity — it is very often far removed from that; but there 
must not be any condescension. There must be a 
desire for equality, at all events. Each must lament 
anything, whether it is superiority or inferiority, which 
keeps the two apart. It must be a desire for unity 
above everything. There must not be the smallest 
shadow of contempt on either side — it must be a 
frank proffer of the best you have to give, and a 
knowledge that the other can give you something — 
sympathy, support, help — which you cannot do 
without. What breaks friendship, in my experience, 
is the loss of that sense of equality; and the moment 
that friends become critical — in the sense, I mean, 
that they want to alter or improve each other — I 
think a friendship is in danger. If you have a friend, 
you must be indulgent to his faults — like him, not 
in spite of them, but almost because of them, I think. " 



Of Friendship 109 

"That's very difficult," said Vincent. "Mayn't 
you want a friend to improve? If he has some patent 
and obvious fault, I mean?" 

"You mustn't want to improve him," said Father 
Payne, smiling; "that's not your business — unless 
he wants you to help him to improve; and even then 
you have to be very delicate-handed. It must hurt 
you to have to wish him different. " 

"But isn't that what you call sentimental?" said 
Vincent. 

"No," said Father Payne, "it is sentiment to try 
to pretend to yourself and others that the fault isn't 
there. But I am speaking of a tie which you can't 
risk breaking for anything so trivial as a fault. The 
moment that the fault stands out, naked and un- 
pleasant, then you may know that the friendship is 
over. There must be a glamour even about your 
friend's faults. You must love them, as you love 
the dints and cracks in an old building." 

"That seems to me weak," said Vincent. 

"You will find that it is true," said Father Payne. 
"We can't afford to sit in judgment on each other. 
We must simply try to help each other along. We 
must not say, ' You ought not to be tired. ' " 

"But surely we may pity people?" said Lestrange. 

"Not your friends," said Father Payne. "Pity 
is fatal to friendship. There is always something 
complacent in pity — it means conscious strength. 
You can't both pity and admire. You can't separate 
people up into qualities — they all come out of the 
depth of a man; I am quite sure of this, that the 
moment you begin to differentiate a friend's qualities, 
that moment what I call friendship is over. It must 
simply be a case of you and me — not my weakness and 



no Father Payne 

your virtue, and still less your weakness and my virtue. 
And you must be content to lose friends and to be dis- 
carded by friends. What is sentimental is to believe 
that it can be otherwise." 



XIX 

OF PHYLLIS 

I T was in the course of July, the month given to 
1 hospitality. Father Payne used to have guests of 
various kinds, quite unaccountable people, some of 
them, with whom he seemed to be on the easiest 
of terms, but whom he never mentioned at any other 
time. "It is a time when I have old friends to stay 
with me," he once said, "and I decline to define 
the term. There are reasons — you must assume that 
there are reasons — which may not be apparent, for the 
tie. They are not all selected for intellectual or 
artistic brilliance — they are the symbols of undesigned 
friendships, which existed before I exercised the faculty 
of choice. They are there, uncriticized, unexplained, 
these friends of mine. The modest man, you will 
remember, finds his circle ready-made. I am at- 
tached to them, and they to me. They understand 
no language, some of them, as you will see, except the 
language of the heart; but you will help me, I know, 
to make them feel at home and happy. " 

They certainly were odd people, several of them — 
dumb, good-natured, elderly men with no ostensible 
purpose in the world; elderly ladies, who called Father 
Payne "dear"; some simple and homely married 
couples, who seemed to be living in another century. 
But Father Payne welcomed them, chattered with 



ii2 Father Payne 

them, jested with them, took them drives and walks, 
and seemed well-contented with their company, 
though I confess that I generally felt as though I were 
staying in a seaside boarding-house on such occasions. 
We used to speculate as to who they were, and how 
Father Payne had made their acquaintance: we 
gathered that they were mostly the friends and 
acquaintances of his youth, or people into whose com- 
pany he had drifted when he lived in London. Some- 
times, before a new arrival, he would touch off his or 
her character and circumstances in a few words. On 
one occasion he said after breakfast to Barthrop and 
me: "Arrivals today, Mr. and Mrs. Wetherall — the 
man a retired coal-merchant, rather wealthy, in- 
terested in foreign missions ; the woman inert ; daughter 
prevented from coming, and they bring a niece, Phyllis 
by name, understood to be charming. I undertake 
the sole charge of Wetherall himself, Mrs. Wetherall 
requires no specific attentions — placid woman, writes 
innumerable letters — Miss Phyllis an unknown 
quantity." 

The Wetheralls duly appeared, and proved very 
simple people. Father Payne, to our surprise, seemed 
to be soaked in mission literature, and drew out Mr. 
Wetherall with patient skill. But Miss Phyllis was 
a perfectly delightful girl, very simple and straight- 
forward, extremely pretty in a boyish fashion, and 
quite used to the ways of the world. We would will- 
ingly have entertained her, and did our best ; but she 
made fast friends with Father Payne, with the ut- 
most promptitude, and the two were for ever strolling 
about or sitting out together. The talk at meals was 
of a sedate character, but Miss Phyllis used to inter- 
cept Father Payne's humorous remarks with a de- 



Of Phyllis 113 

lighted little smile, and Father Payne would shake 
his head gravely at her in return. Miss Phyllis said 
to me one morning, as we were sitting in the garden; 
"You seem to have a very good time here, all of you — 
it feels like something in a book — it is too good to be 
true!" 

"Ah," I said, "but this is a holiday, of course! 
We work very hard in term-time, and we are very 
serious." Miss Phyllis looked at me with her blue 
eyes in silence for a moment, with an ironical little 
curve of her lips, and said : "I don't believe a word of 
it ! I believe it is just a little Paradise, and I suspect 
it of being rather a selfish Paradise. Why do you shut 
everyone out?" 

" Oh , it is a case of ' business first ' ! " I said. ' ' Father 
Payne keeps us all in very good order." "Yes," 
said Phyllis, " I expect he can do that. But do any of 
you men realize what an absolutely enchanting person 
he is? I have never seen any one in the least like 
him! He understands everything, and sees every- 
thing, and cares for everything — he is so big and kind 
and clever. Why, isn't he something tremendous?" 
"He is," I said. "Oh yes, but you know what I 
mean," said Miss Phyllis; "he's a great man, and he 
ought to have the reins in his hand. He ought not to 
potter about here!" 

' ' Well, ' ' I said, ' ' I have wondered about that myself. 
But he knows his own mind — he's a very happy man! " 
Miss Phyllis pondered silently, and said: "I don't 
think you realize your blessings. Father Payne is 
like the boy in the story — the man born to be king, 
you know. He ought not to be wasted like this! He 
ought to be ruler over ten cities. Dear me, I don't 
often wish I were a man, but I would give anything to 



ii4 Father Payne 

be one of you. Won't you tell me something more 
about him?" 

I did my best, and Phyllis listened absorbed, dan- 
gling a shapely little foot over her knee, and playing 
with a flower. "Yes," she said at last, "that is what 
I thought! I see you do appreciate him after all. I 
won't make that mistake again." And she gave me a 
fine smile. I liked the company of this radiant crea- 
ture, but at this moment Father Payne appeared at the 
other end of the garden. "Don't think me rude, " said 
Miss Phyllis, "but I am going to talk to Father Payne. 
It's my last day, and I must get all I can out of him. " 
She fled, and presently they went off together for a 
stroll, a charming picture. She carried him off like- 
wise after dinner, and they sat long in the dusk. I 
could hear Father Payne's emphatic tones and 
Phyllis' s refreshing laughter. 

The next morning the Wetheralls went off. Bar- 
throp and I, with Father Payne, saw them go. The 
Wetheralls were serenely enjoying the prospect of 
returning home after a successful visit, but Miss 
Phyllis looked mournful, and as if she were struggling 
with concealed emotions. She kissed her hand to 
Father Payne as the carriage drove away. 

"Very worthy people!" said Father Payne cheer- 
fully, as the carriage passed out of sight. "I am 
very glad to have seen them, and no less thankful 
that they are gone. " 

"But the charming Phyllis?" said Barthrop. "Is 
that all you have to say about her? I never saw a 
more delightful girl!" 

"She is — quite delightful," said Father Payne. 
"Phyllis is my only joy! The sight of her and the 
sound of her make me feel as if I had been reading an 



Of Phyllis 115 

Elizabethan song-book — 'Sing hey, nonny nonny!' 
But why didn't one of you fellows make up to her? — 
that's a girl worth the winning!" 

"Why didn't we make up to her?" 1 said indig- 
nantly. "I wonder you have the face to ask, Father! 
Why, she was simply taken up with you, and she 
hadn't a word or a look for anyone else. I never saw 
such a case of love at first sight!" 

"She gave me a flower this morning," said Father 
Payne meditatively, "and I believe I kissed her hand. 
It was like a scene in one of my novels. It wasn't 
my fault — the woman tempted me, of course! But I 
think she is a charming creature, and as clever as she 
is pretty. I could have made love to her with the best 
will in the world! But that wouldn't do, and I just 
made friends with her. She wants an older friend, I 
think. She has ideas, the pretty Phyllis, and she 
doesn't strike out sparks from the Wetherallsmuch." 

Barthrop went off, smiling to himself, and I strolled 
about with Father Payne. 

"You really could hardly do better than be Phyllis's 
faithful shepherd," he said to me, smiling. "She's 
a fine creature, you know, full of fire and vitality, and 
eager for life. She must marry a nice man and have 
nice children. We want more people like Phyllis. 
You consider it, old man! I would like to see you 
happily married." 

"Why, Father, " I said boldly, "if you feel like that, 
why don't you put in for her yourself? Phyllis is in 
love with you! You may not know it — she may not 
know it — but I know it. She could talk of nothing 
else." 

"Get thee behind me, Satan!" said Father Payne 
very emphatically. "Don't say such things to me! 



n6 Father Payne 

The pretty Phyllis wants a father confessor — that's 
all I can do for her." 

"I don't think that is so, Father," I said. "She 
would be prepared for something much closer than 
that, if you held out your hand. " 

Father Payne smiled benignantly at me. "Yes, 
I know what you mean, old man," he said, "and I 
daresay it is true! But I mustn't allow myself to 
think of such things at my age. It wouldn't do. I'm 
old enough to be her father — and she has just had a 
pretty fancy, that's all. It's rather a romantic setting, 
this place, you know; and she is hungering and thirst- 
ing for all sorts of ideas and beautiful adventures ; and 
she finds a good-humoured old bird like myself, who 
can give her something of what she wants. She is 
fitful and impetuous, and she wants something strong 
and fatherly to lean upon and to worship, perhaps. 
Bless you, I see it all clearly enough! But put the 
clock on for a few years : the charming Phyllis is made 
for better things than tying my muffler and walking 
beside my bath-chair. No, she must have a run for 
her money. And what's more, I'm not sure that I 
want the sole charge of that sweet nymph — she would 
want a lot of response and sympathy and understand- 
ing. It's altogether too big a job for me, and I don't 
feel the call. What do I want, then, with the pretty 
child? Why, I like to be with her, and to see her, and 
to hear her talk and laugh. I want to help her along 
if I can — she is a high-spirited creature, and will take 
things hardly. But I cannot be romantic, and take 
advantage of a romantic child. Mind you, I think 
that these friendsh ps between men and women are 
good for both, if they aren't complicated by love: the 
worst of it is that passion is a tindery thing, and lights 



Of Phyllis 117 

up suddenly when people least expect it. But I'm 
too old for all that ; and one of the pleasures of growing 
old is that one can see a beautiful creature like Phyllis 
— high-spirited, vivid, full of grace and delight — 
without wanting to claim her for one's own or take 
her away into a corner. I'm just glad to be with her, 
glad to think she is in the world, glad to think she 
comes direct from the Divine hand. It moves me 
tremendously, that flashing and brightening charm of 
hers — but I see and feel it, I think, as something 
beyond and outside of her, which comes as a message 
tome. She's a darling! But I am not going to inter- 
fere with her or complicate her life. She must find a 
fit mate, and I am going to let her feel that she can 
depend on me for any service I can do for her. I don't 
mind saying, old man," added Father Payne, in a 
different tone, "that there isn't a touch of temptation 
about it all. I yield in imagination to it quite frankly 
— I think how jolly it would be to have a creature like 
that living in this old house, telling me all she thought 
about, making a home beautiful. I could make a very 
fair lover if I tried! But I have got myself well in 
hand, and I know better. It isn't what she wants, and 
it isn't really what I want. I have got my work cut 
out for me; but I'll give her all I can, and be thankful 
if she gives me a bit of her heart; and I shall love to 
think of her going about the world, and reminding 
everyone she meets of the best and purest sort of 
beauty. I love Phyllis with all my old heart — is that 
enough for you? — and a great deal too well to confis- 
cate her, as I should certainly have tried to do twenty 
years ago." 

Father Payne stopped, and looked at me with one 
of his great clear smiles. 



n8 Father Payne 

"Well, I must say," I began 

"No, you mustn't," said Father Payne. "I know 
all the excellent arguments you would advance. Why 
shouldn't two people be happy and not look ahead, 
and all that? I do look ahead, and I'm going to make 
her happy if I can. Shall I use my influence in your 
favour, my boy? How does that strike you?" 

I laughed and reddened. Father Payne put his 
arm in mine, and said: "Now, I have turned my 
heart out for your inspection, and you can't convert 
me. Let the pretty child go her way! I only wish 
she was likely to get more fun out of the Wetheralls. 
Such excellent people too: but a lack of inspiration — 
not propelled from quite the central fount of beauty, 
I fancy ! But it will do Phyllis good to make the best 
of them, and I fancy she is trying pretty hard. Dear 
me, I wish she were my niece! But I couldn't have 
her here — we should all be at daggers drawn in a fort- 
night: that's the puzzling thing about these beautiful 
people, that they light up such conflagrations, and 
make such havoc of divine philosophy, old boy!" 



XX 

OF CERTAINTY 

WE were returning from a walk, Father Payne and 
I; as we passed the churchyard, he said: "Do 
you remember that story of Lamennais at La Chenaie? 
He was sitting behind the chapel under two Scotch 
firs which grew there, with some of his young disciples. 
He took his stick, and marked out a grave on the turf, 
and said: ' It is there I would wish to be buried, but no 
tombstone! Only a simple mound of grass. Oh, 
how well I shall be there!' That is what I call senti- 
ment. If Lamennais really thought he would be 
confined in spirit to such a place, he would not tolerate 
it — least of all a combative fellow like Lamennais — it 
would be a perpetual solitary confinement. Such a 
cry is merely a theatrical way of saying that he felt 
tired. Yet it is such sayings which impress people, 
because men love rhetoric." 

Presently he went on: "It is strange that what 
one fears in death is the vagueness and the solitude 
of it — we are afraid of finding ourselves lost in the 
night. It would be agitating, but not frightful, if 
we were sure of finding company; and if we were sure 
of meeting those whom we had loved and lost, death 
would not frighten us at all. Dying is simple enough, 
and indeed easy, for most of us. But I expect that 
something very precise and definite happens to us 
119 



120 Father Payne 

the moment we die. It is probable, I think, that we 
shall set about building up a new body to inhabit at 
once, as a snail builds its shell. We are very definite 
creatures, all of us, with clearly apportioned tastes and 
energies, preferences and dislikes. The only puzzling 
thing is that we do not all of us seem to have the bodies 
which suit us here on earth: fiery spirits should have 
large phlegmatic bodies, and they too often have weak 
and inadequate bodies. Beautiful spirits cannot 
always make their bodies beautiful, and evil people 
have often very lovely shapes and faces. I confess 
I find all that very mysterious; heredity is quite 
beyond me. If it were merely confined to the body 
and even the mind, I should not wonder at it, but 
it seems to affect the soul as well. Who can feel free 
in will, if that is the case? And now, too, they say 
with some certainty that it seems as though all their 
own qualities need not be transmitted by parents, but 
that no quality can be transmitted which is not present 
in the parents — that we can lose qualities, that is, but 
not gain them. If that is true, then all our qualities 
were present in primitive forms of life, and we are not 
really developing, we are only specializing. All this 
hurts one to think of, because it ties us hand and foot. " 

Presently he went on: "How ludicrous, after all 
to make up our mind about things as most of us do ! 
I believe that the desire for certainty is one of the 
worst temptations of the devil. It means closing our 
eyes and minds and hearts to experience; and yet it 
seems the only way to accomplish anything. I trust, ' ' 
he said, turning to me with a look of concern, "that 
you do not feel that you are being formed or moulded 
here, by me or by any of the others? " 

"No," I said, "certainly not! I feel, indeed, since 



Of Certainty 121 

I came here, that I have got a wider horizon of ideas, 
and I hope I am a little more tolerant. I have cer- 
tainly learnt from you not to despise ideas or experi- 
ences at first sight, but to look into them. " 

He seemed pleased at this, and said: "Yes, to look 
into them — we must do that ! When we see any one 
acting in a way that we admire, or even in a way which 
we dislike, we must try to see why he acts so, what 
makes him what he is. We must not despise any 
indications. On the whole, I think that people be- 
have well when they are happy, and ill when they are 
afraid. All violence and spite come when we are 
afraid of being left out ; and we are happy when we are 
using all our powers. Don't be too prudent ! Don't 
ever be afraid of uprooting yourself," he added with 
great emphasis. "Try experiments — in life, in work, 
in companionship. Have an open mind! That is 
why we should be so careful what we pray for, because 
in my experience prayers are generally granted, and 
often with a fine irony. The grand irony of God! 
It is one of the things that most reassures me about 
Him, to find that He can be ironical and indulgent; 
because our best chance of discovering the nature of 
things is that we should be given what we wish, just 
in order to find out that it was not what we wished 
at all!" 

"But," I said, "if you are for ever experimenting, 
always moving on, always changing your mind, don't 
you run the risk of never mixing with life at all ? " 

"Oh, life will take care of that ! " said Father Payne, 
smiling. "The time will come when you will know 
where to post your battery, and what to fire at. But 
don't try to make up your mind too early — don't try 
to fortify yourself against doubts and anxieties. That 



122 . Father Payne 

is the danger of all sensitive people. You can't 
attain to proved certainties in this life — at least, you 
can't at present. I don't say that there are not cer- 
tainties — indeed, I think that it is all certainty, and 
that we mustn't confuse the unknown with the 
unknowable. As you go on, if you are fair-minded 
and sympathetic, you will get intuitions: you will 
discover gradually exactly what you are worth, and 
what you can do, and how you can do it best. But 
don't expect to know that too soon. And don't yield 
to the awful temptation of saying, ' So many good, fine, 
reasonable people seem certain of this and that ; I had 
better assume it to be true. ' It isn't better, it is only 
more comfortable. A great many more people suffer 
from making up their mind too early and too decisively 
than suffer from open-mindedness and the power to 
relate new experience to old experience. No one 
can write you out a prescription for life. You can't 
anticipate experience; and if you do, you will only 
find that you have to begin all over again. " 



XXI 

OF BEAUTY 

FATHER PAYNE had been away on one of his rare 
journeys. He always maintained that a journey 
was one of the most enlivening things in the world, 
if it was not too often indulged in. "It intoxicates 
me," he said, "to see new places, houses, people." 

"Why don't you travel more, then?" said someone. 

"For that very reason," said Father Payne; "be- 
cause it intoxicates me — and I am too old for that sort 
of self-indulgence!" 

"It's a dreadful business," he went on, "that 
northern industrial country. There's a grandeur 
about it — the bare valleys, the steep bleak fields, the 
dead or dying trees, the huge factories. Those great 
furnaces, with tall iron cylinders and galleries, and 
spidery contrivances, and black pipes, and engines 
swinging vast burdens about, and moving wheels, 
are fearfully interesting and magnificent. They stand 
for all sorts of powers and forces; they frighten me by 
their strength and fierceness and submissiveness. But 
the land is awfully barren of beauty, and I doubt if 
that can be wholesome. It all fascinates me, it 
increases my pride, but it makes me unhappy too, 
because it excludes beauty so completely. Those 
bleak stone-walled fields of dirty grass, the lines of 
grey houses, are fine in their way — but one wants 
123 



124 Father Payne 

colour and clearness. I longed for a glimpse of elms 
and water-meadows, and soft-wooded pastoral hills. 
It produces a shrewd, strong, good-tempered race, but 
very little genius. There is something harsh about 
Northerners — they haven't enough colour." 

"But you are always saying," said Rose, "that 
we must look after form, and chance colour." 

"Yes, but that is because you are in statu pupillari, " 
said Father Payne. "If a man begins by searching 
for colour and ornament and richness, he gets clotted 
and glutinous. Colour looks after itself — but it isn't 
clearness that I am afraid of, it is shrewdness — I think 
that is, on the whole, a low quality, but it is awfully 
strong ! What I am afraid of, in a bare laborious coun- 
try like that, is that people should only think of what 
is comfortable and sensible. Imagination is what 
really matters. It is not enough to have solid emo- 
tions; one ought not to be too reasonable about emo- 
tions. The thing is to care in an unreasonable and 
rapturous way about beautiful things, and not to 
know why one cares. That is the point of things 
which are simply beautiful and nothing else, — that 
you feel it isn't all capable of explanation. " 

"But isn't that rather sentimental?" said Rose. 

" No, no, it's just the opposite, " said Father Payne. 
"Sentiment is when one understands and exaggerates 
an emotion; beauty isn't that — it is something mys- 
terious and inexplicable; it makes you bow the head 
and worship. Take the sort of thing you may see on 
the coast of Italy — a blue sea, with grey and orange 
cliffs falling steeply down into deep water; a gap, with 
a clustering village, coming down, tier by tier, to the 
sea's edge; fantastic castles on spires of rock, thickets 
and dingles running down among the clefts and out 



Of Beauty 125 

on the ledges, and perhaps a glimpse of pale, fantastic 
hills behind. No one could make it or design it; but 
every line, every blending colour, all combine to give 
you the sense of something marvellously and joyfully 
contrived, and made for the richness and sweetness of 
it. That is the sort of moment when I feel the over- 
whelming beauty and nearness of God — everything 
done on a vast scale, which floods mind and heart with 
utter happiness and wonder. Anything so over- 
poweringly joyful and delicious and useless as all that 
must come out of a fulness of joy. The sharp cliffs 
mean some old cutting and slashing, the blistering and 
burning of the earth ; and yet those old rents have been 
clothed and mollified by some power that finds it 
worth while to do it — and it isn't done for you or me, 
either — there must be treasures of loveliness going on 
hidden for centuries in tropic forests. It's done for 
the sake of doing it; and we are granted a glimpse of it, 
just to show us perhaps that we are right to adore it, 
and to try in our clumsy way to make beautiful things 
too. That is why I envy the musician, because he 
creates beauty more directly than any other mind — 
and the best kind of poetry is of the same order." 

"But isn't there a danger in all this ? ' ' said Lestrange. 
"No, I don't want to say anything priggish," he 
added, seeing a contraction of Father Payne's brows; 
"I only want to say what I feel. I recognize the fas- 
cination of it as much as anyone can — but isn't it, 
as you said about travelling, a kind of intoxication? 
I mean, may it not be right to interpose it, but yet not 
right to follow it? Isn't it a selfish thing, and doesn't 
it do the very thing which you often speak against — ■ 
blind us to other experience, that is? " 

"Yes, there is something in that," said Father 



126 Father Payne 

Payne. ' ' Of course that is always the difficulty about 
the artist, that he appears to live selfishly in joy — 
but it applies to most things. The best you can do for 
the world is often to turn your back upon it. Phi- 
lanthropy is a beautiful thing in its way, but it must be 
done by people who like it — it is useless if it is done in 
a grim and self -penalizing way. If a man is really big 
enough to follow art, he had better follow it. I do 
not believe very much in the doctrine that service to 
be useful must be painful. No one doubts that 
Wordsworth gave more joy to humanity by living 
his own life than if he had been a country doctor. 
Of course the sad part of it is when a man follows art 
and does not succeed in giving pleasure. But you 
must risk that — and a real devotion to a thing gives 
the best chance of happiness to a man, and is perhaps, 
too, his best chance of giving something to others. 
There is no reason to think that Shakespeare was a 
philanthropist." 

"But does that apply to things like horse-racing 
or golf?" said Rose. 

"No, you must not pursue comfort," said Father 
Payne ; "but I don't believe in the theory that we have 
all got to set out to help other people. That implies 
that a man is aware of valuable things which he has 
to give away. Make friends if you can, love people 
if you can, but don't do it with a sense of duty. Do 
what is natural and beautiful and attractive to do. 
Make the little circle which surrounds you happy 
by sympathy and interest. Don't deal in advice. 
The only advice people take is that with which they 
agree. And have your own work. I think we are — 
many of us — afraid of enjoying work; but in any case, 
if we can show other people how to perceive and enjoy 



Of Beauty 127 

beauty, we have done a very great thing. The sense 
of beauty is growing in the world. Many people are 
desiring it, and religion doesn't cater for it, nor does 
duty cater for it. But it is the only way to make pro- 
gress — and religion has got to find out how to include 
beauty in its program, or it will be left stranded. 
Nothing but beauty ever lifted people higher — the 
unsensuous, inexplicable charm, which makes them 
ashamed of dull, ugly, greedy, quarrelsome ways. 
It is only by virtue of beauty that the world climbs 
higher — and if the world does climb higher by some- 
thing which isn't obviously beautiful, it is only that 
we do not recognize it as beautiful. Sin and evil are 
signals from the unknown, of course; but they are 
danger signals, and we follow them with terror — but 
beauty is a signal too, and it is the signal made by 
peace and happiness and joy." 



XXII 

OF WAR 

THE talk one evening turned on war; Lestrange 
said that he believed it was good for a nation to 
have a war : "It unites them with the sense of a com- 
mon purpose, it evokes self-sacrifice, it makes them 
turn to God." 

"Yes, yes, " said Father Payne, rather impatiently. 
"But you can't personify a nation like that; that 
personification of societies and classes and sections of 
the human race does no end of harm. It is all a 
matter of statistics, not of generalization. Take your 
three statements. ' It is good for a nation to have a 
war. ' You mean, I suppose, that, in spite of the loss 
of the best stock and the disabling of strong young 
men, and the disintegration of families, and the hid- 
eous waste of time and money — subtracting all that — 
there is a balance of good to the survivors? " 

"Yes, I think so, " said Lestrange. 

"But are you sure about this?" said Father Payne. 
"How do you know? Would you feel the same if you 
yourself were turned out a helpless invalid for life with 
your occupation gone ? Are you sure that you are not 
only expressing the feeling of relief in the community 
at having a danger over? Is it more than the sense 
of gratitude of a man who has not suffered unbearably, 
to the people who have died and suffered? The only 
128 



Of War 129 

evidence worth having is that of the real sufferers. 
Take the case of the people who have died. You 
can't get evidence from them. It is an assumption 
that they are content to have died. Is not the glory 
which surrounds them — and how short a time that 
lasts! — a human attempt to make consciences com- 
fortable, and to relieve human doubts? The worst 
of that theory is that it makes so light of the worth of 
life; and, after all, a soldier's business is to kill and not 
to be killed; while, generally speaking, the worst turn 
that a strong, healthy, and honest man can do to his 
country is to die prematurely. Of course war has a 
great and instinctive prestige about it; are we not 
misled by that into accepting it as an inevitable 
business?" 

"No, I believe there is a real gain, " said Lestrange, 
"in the national sense of unity, in the feeling of having 
been equal to an emergency." 

"But are you speaking of a nation which conquers 
or a nation which is defeated?" said Father Payne. 

"Both," said Lestrange; "it unites a nation in any 
case." 

"But if a nation is defeated," said Father Payne, 
"are they the better for the common depression of not 
having been equal to the emergency ? ' ' 

"It may make them set their teeth, " said Lestrange, 
"and prepare themselves better. " 

"Then it does not matter," said Father Payne, 
"whether they are united by the complacency of 
conquest or by the desire for revenge?" 

"I would not quite say that," said Lestrange. 
"But at all events a desire for revenge might teach 
them discipline." 

"I can't believe that," said Father Payne; "it 
9 



130 Father Payne 

seems to me to make all the difference what the pur- 
pose has been. I do not believe that a nation gains by- 
being united for a predatory and aggressive purpose. 
I think the victory of the Germans in the Franco- 
Prussian war has been wholly bad for them. It has 
made them believe in aggressiveness. A nation nat- 
urally philosophical and moral, and also both ener- 
getic and stupid, acquires the sense of a divine mission 
like that. I don't believe that a belief in your own 
methods of virtue is a wholesome belief. That 
seems to me likely to perpetuate war — and I sup- 
pose that we should all believe that war was an 
evil, if we could produce the good results of it without 
war." 

We all agreed to this. 

"I will grant, " said Father Payne, "that if a nation 
which sincerely believes in peace and wishes to culti- 
vate good will is wantonly and aggressively attacked, 
and repels that attack, it may gain much from war 
if it sticks to its theory, does not attempt reprisals, 
and leaves the conquered bully in a position to see its 
mistake and regain its self-respect. But it is a very 
dangerous kind of success for all that. I do not believe 
that complacency ever does anything but harm. The 
purpose must be a good one in the first place, the cause 
must be a great one, and it must be honestly pursued 
to the end, if it is to help a nation. But it lets all 
sorts of old and evil passions loose, and it makes 
slaughter glorious. No, I believe that at best it is a 
relapse into barbarism. Hardly any nation is strong 
enough and great enough to profit either by conquest 
or by defeat." 

"But what about the splendid self-sacrifice it all 
evokes?" said Lestrange. "People give up their 



Of War 131 

comfort, their careers, they go to face the last risk — is 
that nothing?" 

"No, " said Father Payne; "it is a very magnificent 
and splendid thing, — I don't deny that. But even 
so, that can't be preserved artificially. I mean that 
no one would think that, if there were no chance of a 
real war, it would be a good thing to evoke such self- 
sacrifice by having manoeuvres in which the best 
youth of the country were pitted against each other, 
to kill each other if possible. There must be a real 
cause behind it. No one would say it was a noble 
thing for the youth of a country to fling themselves 
down over a cliff or to infect themselves with leprosy 
to show that they could despise suffering and death. 
If it were possible to settle the differences between 
nations without war, war would be a wholly evil thing. 
The only thing that one can say is that while there 
exists a strong nation which believes enough in war 
to make war aggressively, other nations are bound to 
resist it. But the nation which believes in war is ipso 
facto an uncivilized nation. " 

"But does not a war," said Lestrange, "clear the 
air, and take people away from petty aims and trivial 
squabbles into a sterner and larger atmosphere?" 

"Yes, I think it does," said Father Payne; "but 
a great pestilence might do that. We might be thank- 
ful for all the good we could get out of a pestilence, and 
be grateful for it; but we should never dream of arti- 
fically renewing it for that reason. I look upon war 
as a sort of pestilence, a contagion which spreads under 
certain conditions. But we disguise the evil of it from 
ourselves, if we allow ourselves to believe in its being 
intrinsically glorious. I can't believe that highway 
robbery has only to be organized on a sufficiently large 



132 Father Payne 

scale to make it glorious. A man who resists highway 
robbery, and runs the risk of death, because he wants 
to put a stop to it, seems to me a noble person — quite 
different from the man who sees a row going on and 
joins in it because he does not want to be out of a good 
thing! Do you remember the story of the Irishman 
who saw a fight proceeding, and rushed into the fray 
wielding his shillelagh, and praying that it might fall 
on the right heads? We have all of us uncivilized 
instincts, but it does not make them civilized to join 
with a million other people in indulging them. I 
think that a man who refuses to join from conviction, 
at the risk of being hooted as a coward, is probably 
doing a braver thing still." 

"But I have often heard you say that life must be 
a battle," said Lestrange. 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but I know what I 
want to fight. I want the human race to join in fight- 
ing crime and disease, evil conditions of nurture, dis- 
honesty, and sensuality. I don't want to pit the 
finest stock of each country against each other. That 
is simple suicide, for two nations to kill off the men 
who could fight evil best. I want the nations to com- 
bine collectively for a good purpose, not to combine 
separately for a bad one." 

"I see that," said Lestrange; "but I regard war as 
an inevitable element in society as at present con- 
stituted. I don't think the world can be persuaded 
out of it. If it ever ceases, it will die a natural death 
because it will suddenly be regarded as absurd. 
Meantime, I think it is our duty to regard the benefits 
of it ; and, as I said, it turns a nation to God — it takes 
them out of petty squabbles, and makes them recog- 
nize a power beyond and behind the world, " 



Of War 133 

"Yes, that is so, " said Father Payne, "if you regard 
war as caused by God. But I rather believe that it is 
one of the things that God is fighting against! And 
I don't agree that it produces a noble temper all 
through. It does in many of the combatants; but 
there is nothing so characteristic at the outbreak of 
war as the amount of bullying that is done. Peaceful 
people are hooted at and shouted down; thousands of 
general convictions are overridden; the violent have 
it their own way ; it seems to me to organize the unruly 
and obstreperous, and to force all gentler and more 
civilized natures into an unconvinced silence. Many 
of the people who do most for the happiness of the 
world can't face unpopularity. They are apt to think 
that there must be something wrong with themselves, 
something spiritless and abnormal, if they find them- 
selves loathing the cruelties of which others seem to 
approve. I do not believe that war organizes whole- 
some and sane opinion; I believe that it silences it. 
It is a time when base, heartless, cruel people can 
become heroes. It is true that it also gives serene, 
courageous, and calm people a great opportunity. 
But on the whole it is abad time for sober, orderly, and 
peaceable people. I believe that it evokes a good many 
fine qualities — simplicity, uncomplaining patience, un- 
selfishness — but it reveals them rather than creates 
them. It shows the worth of a nation, but it should 
want a great deal of evidence before I believe that it 
does more than prove to people that they are braver 
than they know. I can't believe vaguely in death and 
sorrow and disablement and waste being good things. 
It is merely a question of what you are paying so 
ghastly a price for. In the Napoleonic wars the price 
was paid for the liberties of Europe, to show a great 



134 Father Payne 

nation that it must abandon the ideal of domination. 
That is a great cause; but it is great because men are 
evil, and not because they are good. War seems to me 
the temporary triumph of the old bad past over the 
finer and more beautiful future. Do not let us be 
taken in by the romance of it. That is the childish 
view, that loves the sight and sound of the marching 
column and the stirring music. People find it hard to 
believe that anything so strong and gallant and cheer- 
ful can have a sinister side. And no doubt for a 
young, strong, and bold man the excitement of it is 
an intense pleasure. But what we have to ask is 
whether we are right in taking so heavy a toll from 
the world for all that: I do not think it right, 
though it may be inevitable. But then I belong to 
the future, and I think I should be more at home 
in the world a thousand years hence than I am 
to-day. " 

"But I go back to my point," said Lestrange: 
"does not a great war like that send people to their 
knees in faith?" 

"Depend upon it," said Father Payne, "that any- 
thing which makes people acquiesce in preventable 
evil, and see the beautiful effects of death and pain 
and waste, is the direct influence of the devil. It is 
the last and most guileful subtlety that he practises, 
to make us solemnly mournful and patient in the 
presence of calamities for which we have ourselves to 
thank. The only prayer worth praying in the time 
of war is not, 'Help us to bear this,' but 'Help us to 
cure this'; and to behave with meek reverence is to 
behave like the old servant in The Master of Ballantrae 
who bore himself like an afflicted saint under an ill- 
ness, the root of which was drunkenness. The worst 



Of War 135 

religion is that which keeps its sense of repentance 
alive by its own misdeeds!" 

He was silent for a moment, and then he said: 
"No, we mustn't make terms with war, any more than 
we must with cholera. It's a great, heart-breaking 
evil, and it puts everything back a stage. Of course 
it brings out fine qualities — I know that — and so does 
a plague of cholera. It's the evil in both that brings 
out the fine things to oppose it. But we ought to 
have more faith, and believe that the fine qualities 
are there — war doesn't create them, it only shows you 
that they are present — and we believe in war because 
it reassures us about the presence of the great qualities. 
It shows them, and then blows them out, like the 
flame of a candle. But we want to keep them; we 
don't want just to be shown them, with a risk of 
extinguishing them. Example can do something, but 
not half as much as inheritance; and we sweep away 
the inheritance for the sake of the romantic delight 
of seeing the great virtues flare up. No, " he said, 
' ' war is the one of the evil things that is trying to hurt 
mankind, and disguising itself in shining armour; but 
it means men ill; it is for ever trying to bring their 
dreams to an end. " 



XXIII 

OF CADS AND PHARISEES 

"TTIERE are only two sorts of people with whom 

1 it is impossible to live," said Father Payne one 
day, in a loud, mournful tone. 

"Elderly women and young women, I suppose he 
means," said Rose softly. 

"No," said Father Payne, "I protest! I adore 
sensible women, simple women, clever women, all 
non-predatory women — it is they who will not live 
with me. I forget they are not men, and they do not 
like that. And then they are so much more unselfish 
than men, that they have generally axes to grind, 
and I don't like that." 

"Whom do you mean, then?" said I. 

"Cads and Pharisees," said Father Payne, "and 
they are not two sorts really, but one. They are 
the people without imagination. It is that which 
destroys social life, the lack of imagination. The 
Pharisee is the cad with a tincture of Puritanism. " 

"What is the cad, then?" said I. 

"Well, " said Father Payne, "he is very easy to de- 
tect, and not very easy to define. He is the man who 
has got a perfectly definite idea of what he wants, and 
he suffers from isolation. He can't put himself into 
any one's place, or get inside other people's minds. 
He is stupid, and he is unperceptive. He does not 
136 



Of Cads and Pharisees 137 

detect the little looks, gestures, tones of voice, which 
show when people are uncomfortable or disgusted. 
He is not uncomfortable or easily disgusted himself, 
and he does not much mind other people being so. 
He says what he thinks, and you have got to lump it. 
Sometimes he is good-natured enough, and even brave. 
There is an admirable sketch of a good-natured cad in 
one of Mrs. Walford's novels, who is the acme of kind 
indelicacy. The cad is dreadful to live with, because 
he is always making one ashamed, and ashamed of 
being ashamed, because many of the things he does 
do not really matter very much. Then, when he is out 
of sight and hearing, you cannot trust him. He makes 
mischief, he throws mud. If he is vexed with you, 
he injures you with other people. We are all criticized 
behind our backs, of course, and we all have faults 
which amuse and interest our friends; and it is not 
caddish to criticize friends if one is only interested in 
them. But the cad is not interested, except in clearing 
other people out of his way. He is treacherous and 
spiteful. He drops in upon you uninvited, and then he 
tells people he could not get enough to eat. He re- 
peats things you have said about your friends to the 
people of whom you have spoken, leaving out all the 
justifications, and says that he thinks they ought to 
know how you abuse them. He borrows money of 
you, and if you ask him for repayment, he says he is 
not accustomed to be dunned. He never can bring 
himself to apologize for anything, and if you lose your 
temper with him, he says you are getting testy in your 
old age. His one idea is to be formidable, and he says 
that he does not let people take liberties with him. 
He takes a mean and solitary view of the world, and 
other people are merely channels for his own wishes, 



138 Father Payne 

or obstacles to them. The only way is to keep him at 
arm's length, because he is not disarmed by any 
generosity or trustfulness; the discovery of caddish- 
ness in a man is the only excuse for breaking off a 
companionship. The worst of it is that cads are 
sometimes very clever, and don't let the caddishness 
appear till you are hooked. The mischief really is 
that the cad has no morals, no sense of social duty. " 

"What about Pharisees?" said I. 

"Well, the Pharisee has too many morals," said 
Father Payne. "He is the person whose own tastes 
are a sort of standard. If you disagree with him, he 
thinks you must be wicked. If your tastes differ from 
his, they are of the nature of sin. You live under his 
displeasure. If he dresses for dinner, it is sloppy and 
middle-class not to do so. If he doesn't dress for 
dinner, the people who do are either wasting time or 
aping the manners of the great. He is always very 
strong about wasting time. If he likes gardening, he 
says it is the best sort of exercise; if he does not, he 
says that it is bilious work muddling about in a corner. 
Everything that he does is done on principle, but he 
uses his principles to bludgeon other people. If you 
make him the subject of a harmless jest, he says that he 
cannot bear personalities. You can please him only 
by deferring to him, and the only way to manage him 
is by gross flattery. A Pharisee can be a gentleman, 
and he isn't purely noxious like the cad; he is only 
unpleasant and discouraging. He is quite impervious 
to argument, and only says that he thought the prin- 
ciple he is contending for was generally accepted. 
The Pharisee wants in a heavy way to improve the 
world, and thinks meanly of it, while the cad thinks 
meanly of it, and wants to exploit it. The Pharisee 



Of Cads and Pharisees 139 

is a tyrant, and hates freedom; but you can often make 
a friend of him by asking him a favour, if you are 
also prepared to be subsequently reminded of the 
trouble he took to serve you. 

"I think that the Pharisee perhaps does most harm 
in the end, because he hates all experiments. He does 
harm to the young, because he makes them dislike 
virtue and mistrust beauty. The cad does not 
corrupt — in fact, I think he rather improves people, 
because he is so ugly a case of what no one wishes to 
be — and it is better to hate people than to be fright- 
ened of them. If we got a cad and a Pharisee in here, 
for instance, it would be easier to get rid of the cad 
than the Pharisee." 

"I begin to breathe more freely," said Vincent. 
"I had begun to review my conscience." 

Father Payne laughed. "It's all blank cartridge," 
he said. 



XXIV 

OF CONTINUANCE 

I WAS walking with Father Payne in the garden one 
day of spring. I think I liked him better when I 
was alone with him than I did when we were all to- 
gether. His mind expanded more tenderly and 
simply — less epigrammatically. He spoke of this 
once to me, saying: "I am at my best when alone; 
even one companion deflects me. I find myself wish- 
ing to please him, pinching off roughnesses, perfuming 
truth, diplomatizing. This ought not to be, of course; 
and if one was not thorny, self-assertive, stupid, 
it would not be so ; and every companion added makes 
me worse, because the strain of accommodation grows 
— I become vulgar and rough and boisterous in a large 
circle. I often feel: 'How these young men must be 
hating this gibbering and giggling ape, which after all 
is not really me!'" I tried to reassure him, but he 
shook his head, though with a smiling air. "Bar- 
throp is not like that," he said, "the wise Barthrop! 
He is never suspicious or hasty — he does not think it 
necessary to affirm; yet you are never in any doubt 
what he thinks! He moves along like water, never 
anxious if he is held up or divided, creeping on as the 
land lies — that is the right way. " 

Presently he stopped, and looked long at some 
daffodil blades which were thrusting up in a sheltered 
140 



Of Continuance 141 

place. "Look at the grey bloom on those blades," 
he said ; " isn ' t that perfect ? Fancy thinking of that — ■ 
each of them so obviously the same thought taking 
shape, yet each of them different. Do not you see in 
them something calm, continuous, active — happy, in 
fact — at work; often tripped up and imprisoned, and 
thwarted — but moving on?" He was silent a little, 
and then he said: "This force of life — what a fascin- 
ating mystery it is — never dying, never ceasing, 
always coming back to shape itself into matter. I 
wonder sometimes it is not content to exist alone ; but 
no, it is always back again, arranging matter, manipu- 
lating it into beautiful shapes and creatures, never 
discouraged; even when the plant falls ill and begins 
to pine away, the happy life is within it — languid 
perhaps, but just waiting for the release, till the cage 
in which it has imprisoned itself is opened, and then — 
so I believe — back again in an instant somewhere else. 

"I am inclined to believe," he went on, "that that 
is what we are all about; it seems to me the only 
explanation for the fact that we care so much about 
the past and the future. If we are creatures of a day, 
why should we be interested? The only reason we 
care about the past is because we ourselves were there 
in it; and we care about the future because we shall 
be there in it again. " 

"You mean a sort of re-incarnation, " I said. 

"That's an ugly word for a beautiful thing," he 
said. "But this love of life, this impulse to live, to 
protect ourselves, to keep ourselves alive, must surely 
mean that we have always lived and shall always live. 
Some people think that dreadful. They think it is 
taking liberties with them. If they are rich and com- 
fortable and dignified, they cannot bear to think that 



142 Father Payne 

they may have to begin again, perhaps as a baby in a 
slum — or they grow tired, and think they want rest; 
but we can't rest — we must live again, we must be 
back at work; and of course the real hope in it all is 
that, when we do anything to make the world happier, 
it is our own future that we are working for. Who 
could care about the future of the world, if he was to 
be banished from it for ever? I was reading a book 
the other day, in which a wise and a good man said that 
he felt about the future progress of the world as Moses 
did about the promised land, 'not as of something we 
want to have for ourselves, but as of something which 
we want to exist, whether we exist or no. ' I can't 
take so impersonal a view! If one really believed that 
one was going to be extinguished in death, one would 
care no more about the world's future than one cares 
where the passengers in a train are going to, when we 
get out at a station. Who, on arriving at home, can 
lose himself in wondering where his fellow-travellers 
have got to? We have better things to do than that! 
That is the sham altruism. It is as if a boy at school, 
instead of learning his own lesson, spent his time in 
imploring the other boys to learn theirs. That is 
what we are whipped for — for not learning our own 
lesson. " 

"But if all this is so," I said, "why don't we know 
that we shall live again? Why is the one thing which 
is important for us to know hidden from us?" 

"I think we do know it, " said Father Payne, "deep 
down in ourselves. It is why it is worth while to go 
on living. If we believed our reason, which tells us 
that we come to an end and sink into silence, we could 
not care to live, to sutler, to form passionate ties which 
must all be severed, only to sink into nothingness 



Of Continuance 143 

ourselves. If we will listen to our instincts, they 
assure us that it is all worth doing, because it all has a 
significance for us in the life that comes next. " 

"But if we are to go on living," I said, "are we to 
forget all the love and interest and delight of life? 
There seems no continuance of identity without 
memory." 

"Oh, " said Father Payne, "that is another delusion 
of reason. Our qualities remain — our power of being 
interested, of loving, of caring, of suffering. We 
practise them a little in one life, we practise them again 
in the next — that is why we improve. I forget who 
it was who said it, but it is quite true, that there are 
numberless people now alive, who, because of their 
orderliness, their patience, their kindness, their sweet- 
ness, would have been adored as saints if they had lived 
in mediaeval times. And that is the best reason we 
have for suppressing as far as we can our evil disposi- 
tions, and for living bravely and freely in happy en- 
ergy, that we shall make a little better start next time. 
It is not the particular people we love who matter — 
it is the power of loving other people — and if we meet 
again, the same people as those we loved we shall love 
them again ; and if we do not, why, there will be others 
to love. One of the worst limitations I feel is the fact 
that there are so many thousand people on earth whom 
I could love, if I could but meet them — and I am not 
going to believe that this wretched span of days is my 
only chance of meeting them. We need not be in a 
hurry — and yet we have no time to waste! " 

He stopped for a moment, and then added: "When 
I lived in London, and was very poor, and had either 
too much or not enough to do, and was altogether very 
unhappy, I used to wander about the streets and won- 



144 Father Payne 

der how I could be so much alone when there were so 
many possible friends. Just above Ludgate Railway- 
Viaduct, as you go to St. Paul's, there is a church on 
your left, a Wren church, very plain, of white and 
blackened stone, and an odd lead spire at the top. It 
has hardly any ornament, but just over the central 
doorway, under a sort of pediment, there is a little 
childish angel's head, a beautiful little baby face, with 
such an expression of stifled bewilderment. It seems 
to say, 'Why should I hang here, covered with soot, 
with this mob of people jostling along below, in all 
this noise and dirt ? ' The child looks as if it was just 
about to burst into tears. I used to feel like that. I 
used to feel that I was meant to be happy and even 
to make people happy, and that I had been caught and 
pinned down in a sort of pillory. It's a grievous 
mistake to feel like that. Self-pity is the worst of all 
luxuries ! But I think I owe all my happiness to that 
bad time. Coming here was like a resurrection; and 
I never grudged the time when I was face to face with 
a nasty, poky, useless life. And if that can happen 
inside a single existence, I am not going to despair 
about the possibility of its happening in many exist- 
ences. I dreamed the other night that I saw a party of 
little angels singing a song together, all absorbed in 
making music, and I recognized the little child of 
Ludgate Hill in the middle of them singing loud and 
clear. He gave me a little smile and something like a 
wink, and I knew that he had got his promotion. We 
ought all of us, always, to be expecting that. But 
we have got to earn it, of course. It does not come 
if we wait with folded hands." 



XXV 

OF PHILANTHROPY 

FATHER PAYNE told us an odd story to-day of 
a big house on the outskirts of London, with a 
great garden and some fields belonging to it, that was 
shut up for years and seemed neglected. It was 
inhabited by an old retired Colonel and his daughter: 
the daughter had become an invalid, and her mind was 
believed to be affected. No one ever came to the 
house or called there. A wall ran round it, and the 
trees grew thick and tangled within ; the big gates were 
locked. Occasionally the Colonel came out of a side- 
door, a tall handsome man, and took a brisk walk; 
sometimes he would be seen handing his daughter, 
much wrapped up, into a carriage, and they drove 
together. But the place had a sinister air, and was 
altogether regarded with a gloomy curiosity. 

When the Colonel died, it was discovered that the 
place was beautifully kept within, and the house 
delightfully furnished. It came out that, after a 
period of mental depression, the daughter had re- 
covered her spirits, though her health was still delicate. 
The two were devoted to each other, and they decided 
that, instead of living an ordinary sociable life, they 
would just enjoy each other's society in peace. It had 
been the happiest life, simple, tenderly affectionate, 
the two living in and for each other, and one, more- 
i 45 



146 Father Payne 

over, of open-handed, secret benevolence. Apart 
from the expenses of the household, the Colonel's 
wealth had been used to support every kind of good 
work. Only one old friend of the Colonel's was in the 
secret, and he spoke of it as one of the most beautiful 
homes he had ever seen. 

Someone of us criticized the story, and asked 
whether it was not a case of refined selfishness. He 
added rather incisively that the expenditure of money 
on charitable objects seemed to him to show that the 
Colonel's conscience was ill at ease. 

Father Payne was very indignant. He said the 
world had gone mad on philanthropy and social ser- 
vice. Three quarters of it was only fussy ambition. 
He went on to say that a beautiful and simple life was 
probably the thing most worth living in the world, 
and that two people could hardly be better employed 
than in making each other happy. He said that he 
did not believe in self-denial unless people liked it. 
Was it really a finer life to chatter at dinner-parties 
and tea-parties, and occasionally to inspect an or- 
phanage? Perspiration was not the only evidence of 
godliness. Why was it to be supposed that one could 
not live worthily unless one was always poking one's 
nose into one's neighbour's concerns? He said that 
you might as well say that it was refined selfishness to 
have a rose-tree in your garden, unless you cut off 
every bud the moment it appeared and sent it to a 
hospital. If the critic really believed what he said, 
Aveley was no place for him. Let him go to Chicago ! 



XXVI 

OF FEAR 

I FORGET what led up to the subject; perhaps I 
did not hear; but Father Payne said, "It isn't 
for nothing that ' the fearful ' head the list of all the 
abominable people — murderers, sorcerers, idolaters; 
and liars — who are reserved for the lake of fire and brim- 
stone ! Fear is the one thing that we are always wrong 
in yielding to: I don't mean timidity and cowardice, 
but the sort of heavy, mild, and rather pious sort of 
foreboding that wakes one up early in the morning, 
and that takes all the wind out of one's sails; fear of 
not being liked, of having given offence, of living 
uselessly, of wasting time and opportunities. What- 
ever we do, we must not lead an apologetic kind of 
life. If we on the whole intend to do something 
which we think may be wrong, it is better to do it — it 
is wrong to be cautious and prudent. I love experi- 
ments." 

"Isn't that rather immoral?" said Lestrange. 

"No, my dear boy," said Father Payne, "we must 
make mistakes : better make them ! I am not speak- 
ing of things obviously wrong, cruel, unkind, ungener- 
ous, spiteful things; but it is right to give oneself away, 
to yield to impulses, not to take advice too much, and 
not to calculate consequences too much. I hate the 
Robinson Crusoe method of balancing pros and cons. 
147 _. 



148 Father Payne 

Live your own life, do what you are inclined to do, as 
long as you really do it. That is probably the best 
way of serving the world. Don't be argued into 
things, or bullied out of them. You need not parade 
it — but rebel silently. It is absolutely useless going 
about knocking people down. That proves nothing 
except that you are stronger. Don't show up people, 
or fight people; establish a stronger influence if you 
can, and make people see that it is happier and pleas- 
anter to live as you live. Make them envy you — don't 
make them fear you. You must not play with fear, 
and you must not yield to fear. " 



XXVII 



OF ARISTOCRACY 



FATHER PAYNE came into the hall one morning 
after breakfast when I was opening a parcel of 
books which had arrived for me. It was a fine, sunny- 
day, and the sun lit up the portrait framed in the 
panelling over the mantelpiece, an old and skilful 
copy (at least I suppose it was a copy) of Reynolds's 
fine portrait of James, tenth Earl of Shropshire. 
Father Payne regarded the picture earnestly. "Isn't 
he magnificent?" he said. "But he was a very poor 
creature really, and came to great grief. My great- 
great-grandfather! His granddaughter married my 
grandfather. Now look at that — that's the best we 
can do in the way of breeding! There's a man whose 
direct ancestors, father to son, had simply the best 
that money can buy — fine houses to live in, power, 
the pick of the matrimonial market, the best education, 
a fine tradition, every inducement to behave like a 
hero ; and what did he do — he gambled away his inher- 
itance, and died of drink and bad courses. We can't 
get what we want, it would seem, by breeding human 
beings, though we can do it with cows and pigs. 
Where and how does the thing go wrong? His father 
and mother were both of them admirable people — 
fine in every sense of the world. 

"And then people talk, too, as if we had got rid 
149 



150 Father Payne 

of idolatry ! We make a man a peer, we heap wealth 
upon him, and then we worship him for his mag- 
nificence, and are deeply affected if he talks civilly to 
us. We don't do it quite so much now, perhaps — but 
in that man's day, think what an aroma of rank and 
splendour is cast, even in Boswell's Life of Johnson, 
over a dinner-party where a man like that was present ! 
If he paid Johnson the most trumpery of compliments 
Johnson bowed low, and down it went on Boswell's 
cuff! Yet we go on perpetuating it. We don't 
require that such a man should be active, public- 
spirited, wise. If he is fond of field-sports, fairly 
business-like, kindly, courteous, decently virtuous, 
we think him a great man, and feel mildly elated at 
meeting him and being spoken to civilly by him. I 
don't mean that only snobs feel that; but respectable 
people, who don't pursue fashion, would be more 
pleased if an Earl they knew turned up and asked for a 
cup of tea than if the worthiest of their neighbours did 
so. I don't exaggerate the power of rank — it doesn't 
make a man necessarily powerful now, but a very little 
ability, backed up by rank, will go a long way. A 
great general or a great statesman likes to be made an 
Earl; and yet a good many people would like an Earl 
of long descent quite as much. There are a lot of 
people about who feel as Melbourne did when he said 
he liked the Garter so much because there was no 
d — d merit about it. I believe we admire people 
who inherit magnificence better than we admire 
people who earn it ; and while that feeling is there, what 
can be done to alter it?" 

"I don't think I want to alter it," I said; "it is 
very picturesque ! " 

"Yes, there's the mischief," said Father Payne, 



Of Aristocracy 151 

"it is more picturesque, hang it all! The old aristo- 
crat who feels like a prince and behaves like one is 
more picturesque than the person who has sweated 
himself into it. Think of the old Duke who was told 
he must retrench, and that he need not have six still- 
room maids in his establishment, and who said, after 
a brief period of reflection, ' D — n it, a man must have 
a biscuit!' We like insolence! That is to say, we 
like it in its place, because we admire power. It's 
ten times more impressive than the meekness of the 
saint. The mischief is that we like anything from a 
man of power. If he is insolent, we think it grand; 
if he is stupid, we think it a sort of condescension ; if 
he is mild and polite, we think it marvellous; if he is 
boorish, we think it is simple-minded. It is power 
that we admire, or rather success, and both can be 
inherited. If a man gets a big position in England, 
he is always said to grow into it ; but that is because we 
care about the position more than we care about the 
man. 

"When I was younger," he went on, "I used to 
like meeting successful people — it was only rarely that 
I got the chance — but I gradually discovered that 
they were not, on the whole, the interesting people. 
Sometimes they were, of course, when they were big 
animated men, full of vitality and interest. But 
many men use themselves up in attaining success, and 
haven't anything much to give you except their tired 
side. No, I soon found out that freshness was the 
interesting thing, wherever it was to be found — and, 
mind you, it isn't very common. Many people have 
to arrive at success by resolute self-limitation; and 
that becomes very uninteresting. Buoyancy, sym- 
pathy, quick interests, perceptiveness — that's the 



152 Father Payne 

supreme charm; and the worst of it is that it mostly 
belongs to the people who haven't taken too much out 
of themselves. When we have got a really well-ordered 
State, no one will have any reason to work too hard, 
and then we shall all be the happier. These gigantic 
toilers, it's a sort of morbidity, you know; the real 
success is to enjoy work, not to drudge yourself dry. 
One must overflow — not pump!" 

"But what is an artist to do," I said, "who is 
simply haunted by the desire to make something 
beautiful?" 

"He must hold his hand," said Father Payne; "he 
must learn to waste his time, and he must love wast- 
ing it. A habit of creative work is an awful thing. " 

"Come out for a turn," he went on; "never mind 
these rotten books; don't get into a habit of reading — 
it's like endlessly listening to good talk without ever 
joining in it — it makes a corpulent mind!" 

We went and walked in the garden; he stopped 
before some giant hemlocks. "Just look at those 
great things, " he said, "built up as geometrically as a 
cathedral, tier above tier, and yet not quite regular. 
There must be something very hard at work inside 
that, piling it all up, adding cell to cell, carrying out a 
plan, and enjoying it all. Yet the beauty of it is that 
it isn't perfectly regular. You see the underlying 
scheme, yet the separate shoots are not quite mechan- 
ical — they lean away from each other, that joint is a 
trifle shorter — there wasn't quite room at the start 
in that stem, and the pressure goes on showing right 
up to the top. I suppose our lives would look very 
nearly as geometrical to any one who knew — really 
knew; but how little geometrical we feel! I don't 
suppose this hemlock is cursed by the power of think- 



Of Aristocracy 153 

ing it might have done otherwise, or envies the roses. 
We mustn't spend time in envying, or repenting either 
— or still less in renouncing life." 

"But if I want to renounce it," I said, "why 
shouldn't I?" 

"Yes, there you have me," said Father Payne; 
"we know so little about ourselves, that we don't 
always know whether we do better to renounce a thing 
or to seize it. Make experiments, I say — don't make 
habits." 

"But you are always drilling me into habits," I 
said. 

He gave me a little shake with his hand. "Yes, 
the habit of being able to do a thing," he said, "not 
the habit of being unable to do anything else! Hang 
these metaphysics, if that is what they are! What 
I want you young men to do is to get a firm hold upon 
life, and to feel that it is a finer thing than any little 
presentment of it. I want you to feel and enjoy for 
yourselves, and to live freely and generously. Bad 
things happen to all of us, of course; but we mustn't 
mind that — not to be petty or quarrelsome, or hide- 
bound or prudish or over-particular, that's the point. 
To leave other people alone, except on the rare 
occasions when they are not letting other people alone; 
to be peaceable, and yet not to be afraid; not to be 
hurt and vexed; to practise forgetting; not to want 
to pouch things! It's all very wellfor me to talk, " he 
said; "I made a sufficient hash of it, when I was 
poor and miserable and overworked; and then I 
was transplanted out of a slum window-box into a 
sunny garden, just in time; yet I'm sure that most of 
my old troubles were in a way of my own making, 
because I hated being so insignificant; but I fear that 



154 Father Payne 

was a little poison lurking in me from the Earls of 
Shropshire. That is the odd thing about ambitions, 
that they seem so often like regaining a lost position 
rather than making a new one. The truth is that we 
are caged; and the only thing to do is to think about 
the cage as little as we can. " 



XXVIII 

OF CRYSTALS 

ONE day I was strolling down the garden among 
the winding paths, when I came suddenly 
upon Father Payne, who was hurrying towards the 
house. He had in each of his hands a large roughly 
spherical stone, and looked at me a little shamefacedly. 

"You look, Father," I said, "as if you were going 
to stone Stephen. " 

He laughed, and looked at the stones. "Yes," 
he said, "they are what the Greeks called ' handfillers, ' 
for use in battle — but I have no nefarious designs." 

"What are you going to do with them?" I said. 

"That's a secret!" he said, and made as if he were 
going in. Then he said, "Come, you shall hear it — 
you shall share my secret, and be a partner in my 
dreams, as the fisherman says in Theocritus." But 
he did not tell me what he was going to do, and seemed 
half shy of doing so. 

"It's like Dr. Johnson and the orange-peel, " I said. 
"'Nay, Sir, you shall know their fate no further.'" 

"Well, the truth is," he said at last, "that I'm 
a perfect baby. I never can resist looking into a 
hole in the ground, and I happened to look into the 
pit where we dig gravel. I can't tell you how long I 
spent there." 

"What were you doing?" I said. 
i55 



156 Father Payne 

"Looking for fossils," he said; "I had a great 
gift for finding them when I was a child. I didn't 
find any fossils to-day, but I found these stones, and 
I think they contain crystals. I am going to break 
them and see. " 

I took one in my hand. "I think they are only 
fossil sponges," I said; "there will only be a rusty 
sort of core inside. " 

"You know that!" he said, brightening up; "you 
know about stones too? But these are not sponges — 
they would rattle if they were — no, they contain 
crystals — I am sure of it. Come and see!" 

We went into the stable-yard. Father Payne 
fetched a hammer, and then selected a convenient 
place in the cobbled yard to break the stones. He put 
one of them in position, and aimed a blow at it, but it 
glanced off, and the stone flew off with the impact to 
some distance. "Lie still, can't you?" said Father 
Payne, apostrophizing the stone, and adding, "This 
is for my pleasure, not for yours." I recovered the 
stone, and brought it back, and Father Payne broke 
it with a well-directed blow. He gathered up the 
pieces eagerly. "Yes," he said, "it's all right — they 
are blue crystals: better than I had hoped." 

He handed a fragment to me to look at. The 
inside of the stone was hollow. It had a coagulated 
appearance, and was thickly coated with minute 
bluish crystals, very beautiful. 

' ' I don't know that I ever saw a stone I liked as well 
as this," said Father Payne, musing over another 
piece. "Think what millions of years this has been 
like that, — before Abraham was! It has never seen 
the light of day before — it's a splash of some molten 
stone, which fell plop into a cool sea-current, I suppose. 



Of Crystals 157 

I wish I knew all about it. The question is, why is it 
so beautiful? It couldn't help it, I suppose! But for 
whose delight? " Then he said, "I suppose this was a 
vacuum in here till it was broken? That is why it is 
so clear and fresh. Good Heavens, what would I not 
give to know why this thing cooled into these lovely 
little shapes. It's no use talking about the laws of 
matter — why are the laws of matter what they are, 
and not different? And odder still, why do I like 
the look of it?" 

" Perhaps that is a law of matter too, " I said. 

"Oh, shut up!" said Father Payne to me. "But 
I understand — and of course the temptation is to 
believe that this was all done on your account and 
mine. That is as odd a thing as the stone itself, if 
you come to think of it, that we should be made so 
that we refer everything to ourselves, and to believe 
that God prepared this pretty show for us. " 

"I suppose we come in somewhere?" I said. 

"Yes, we are allowed to see it, " said Father Payne. 
"But it wasn't arranged for the benefit of a silly old 
man like me. That is the worst of our religious the- 
ories — that we believe that God is for ever making 
personal appeals to us. It is that sort of self-impor- 
tance which spoils everything." 

"But I can hardly believe that we have this sense 
of self-importance only to get rid of it," I said. "It 
all seems to me a dreadful muddle — to shut up these 
lovely little things inside millions of stones, and then to 
give us the wish to break a couple, only that we may 
reflect that they were not meant for us to see at all. " 

Father Payne gave a groan. "Yes, it is a muddle ! " 
he said. "But one thing I feel clear about — that a 
beautiful thing like this means a sense of joy some- 



158 Father Payne 

where: some happiness went to the making of things 
which in a sense are quite useless, but are unutterably 
lovely all the same. Beauty implies consciousness — 
but come, we are neglecting our business. Give me 
the other stone at once!" 

I gave it him, and he cracked it. "Very disap- 
pointing!" he said. "I made sure there was a 
beautiful stone, but it is all solid — only a flaky sort 
of jelly — it's no use at all!" 

He threw it aside, but carefully gathered up the 
fragments of the crystalline stone. "Don't tell of 
me!" he said, looking at me whimsically. "This is 
the sort of nonsense which our sensible friends won't 
understand. But now that I know that you care 
about stones, we will have a rare hunt together one 
of these days. But mind — no stuff about geology! 
It's beauty that we are in search of, you and I. " 



XXIX 

EARLY LIFE 

ONE day, to my surprise and delight, Father 
Payne indulged in some personal reminiscences 
about his early life. He did not as a rule do this. 
He used to say that it was the surest sign of decadence 
to think much about the past. "Sometimes when I 
wake early, " he said, "I find myself going back to my 
childhood, and living through scene after scene. It's 
not wholesome — I always know I am a little out of 
sorts when I do that — it is only one degree better than 
making plans about the future!" 

However, on this occasion he was very communi- 
cative. He had been talking about Ruskin, and he 
said: "Do you remember in Praterita how Ruskin, 
writing about his sheltered and complacent childhood, 
describes how entirely he lived in the pleasure of sight? 
He noticed everything, the shapes and colours of 
things, the almond blossom, the ants that made nests 
in the garden walk, the things they saw in their travels. 
He was entirely absorbed in sense-impressions. Well, 
that threw a light on my own life, because it was 
exactly what happened to me as a child. I lived 
wholly in observation. I had no mind and very little 
heart. I suppose that I had so much to do looking 
at everything, getting the shapes and the textures and 
the qualities of everything by heart, that I had no 
i59 



160 Father Payne 

time to think about ideas and emotions. I had a 
very lonely childhood, you know, brought up in the 
country by my mother, who was rather an invalid, 
my father being dead. I had no companions to speak 
of, and I didn't care about anyone or need anyone — 
it was all simply a collecting of impressions. The 
result is that I can visualize anything and everything 
— speak of a larch-bud or a fir-cone, and there it is 
before me — the little rosy fragrant tuft, or the glossy 
rectangular squares of the cone. Then I went to 
Marlborough, and I was dreadfully unhappy. I hated 
everything and everybody — the ugliness and sloven- 
liness of it all, the noise, the fuss, the stink. I did 
not feel I had anything in common with those little 
brutes, as I thought them. I lived the life of a blind 
creature in a fright, groping aimlessly about. I joined 
in nothing — but I was always strong, and so I was left 
alone. No one dared to interfere with me; and I have 
sometimes wished I hadn't been so strong, that I had 
had the experience of being weak. I dare say that 
nasty things might have happened — but I should 
have known more what the world was like, I should 
have depended more upon other people, I should have 
made friends. As it was, I left school entirely inno- 
cent, very solitary, very modest, thinking myself a 
complete duffer, and everyone else a beast. It got a 
little better at the end of my time, and I had a com- 
panion or two — but I never dreamed of telling any 
one what I was really thinking about. " 

He broke off suddenly. "This is awful twaddle!" 
he said. "Why should you care to hear about all 
this? I was thinking aloud. " 

"Do go on thinking aloud a little," I said; "it 
is most interesting!" 



Early Life 161 

"Ah," he said, "with the flatterers were busy 
mockers! You enjoy staring and looking upon me." 

"No, no," I said, rather nettled. " Father Payne, 
don't you understand? I want to hear more about 
you. I want to know how you came to be what you 
are : it interests me more than I can say. You asked 
me about myself when I came here, and I told you. 
Why shouldn't I ask you, for a change?" 

He smiled, obviously pleased at this. "Why, 
then," he said, "I'll go on. I'm not above liking to 
tell my tale, like the Ancient Mariner. You can beat 
your breast when you are tired of it. " He was intent 
for a moment, and then went on. "Well, I went up 
to Oxford — to Corpus. A funny little place, I now 
think — rather intellectual. I could hardly believe 
my senses when I found how different it was from 
school, and how independent. Heavens, how happy 
I was! I made some friends — I found I could make 
friends after all — I could say what I liked, I could 
argue, I could even amuse them. I really couldn't 
make you realize how I adored some of those men. I 
used to go to sleep after a long evening of chatter, 
simply hating the darkness which separated me from 
life and company. There were two in particular, very 
ordinary young men, I expect. But they were fond 
of me, and liked being with me, and I thought them 
the most wonderful and enchanting persons, with a 
wide knowledge of the great mysterious world. The 
world! It wasn't, I saw, a nasty, jostling place, as 
I had thought at school, but a great beautiful affair, 
full of love and delight, of interest and ideas. I read, 
I talked, I flew about — it was simply a new birth! 
I felt like a prisoner suddenly released. Of course, 
the mischief was that I neglected my work. There 



1 62 Father Payne 

wasn't time for that: and I fell in love, too, or thought 
I did, with the sister of one of those friends, with 
whom I went to stay. I wonder if anyone was ever 
in love like that! I daresay it's common enough. 
But I won't go into that ; these raptures are for private 
consumption. I was roughly jerked up. I took a 
bad degree. My mother died — I had very little in 
common with her: she was an invalid without any 
hold on life, and I took no trouble to be kind to her — 
I was perfectly selfish and wilful. Then I had to earn 
my living. I would have given anything to stay at 
Oxford: and you know, even now, when I think of 
Oxford, a sort of electric shock goes through me, I love 
it so much. I daren't even set foot there, I'm so 
afraid of finding it altered. But when I think of those 
dark courts and bowery gardens, and the men moving 
about, and the fronts of blistered stone, and the little 
quaint streets, and the meadows and elms, and the 
country all about, I have a physical yearning that is 
almost a pain — a sort of homesickness " 

He broke off, and was silent for a moment, and I 
saw that his eyes were full of tears. 

"Then it was London, that accursed place! I 
had a tiny income: I got a job at a coaching establish- 
ment, I worked like the devil. That was a cruel time. 
I couldn't dream of marriage — that all vanished, and 
she married pretty soon. I couldn't get a holiday — 
I was too poor. I tried writing, but I made a hash 
of that. I simply went down into hell. One of my 
great friends died, and the other — well, it was awkward 
to meet, when I had had to break it off with his sister. 
I simply can't describe to you how utterly horrible it 
all was. I used to teach all the terms, and in the 
vacations I simply mooned about. I hadn't a club, 



Early Life 163 

and I used to read at the Museum — read just to keep 
my senses. Then I suppose I got used to it. Of 
course, if I had had any adventurousness in me, I 
should have gone off and become a day-labourer or 
anything — but I am not that sort of person. 

"That went on till I was about thirty-three — and 
then quite suddenly, and without any warning, I had 
my experience. I suppose that something was going 
on inside me all the time, something being burnt out 
of me in those fires. It was a mixture of selfishness 
and stupidity and perverseness that was the matter 
with me. I didn't see that I could do anything. I 
was simply furious with the world for being such a hole 
and with God for sticking me in the middle of it. 
The occasion of the change was simply too ridiculous. 
It was nothing else but coming back to my rooms and 
finding a big bowl of daffodils there. They had been 
left, my landlady told me, by a young gentleman. It 
sounds foolish enough — but it suddenly occurred to 
me to think that someone was interested in me, pitied 
me, cared for me. A sort of mist cleared away from 
my eyes, and I saw in a flash what was the mischief — 
that I had walled myself in by my misery and bad 
temper, and by my expectation that something must 
be done for me. The next day I had to take a lot of 
pupils, one after another, for composition. One of 
them had a daffodil in his hand, which he put down 
carelessly on the table. I stared at it and at him, and 
he blushed. He wasn't an interesting young man to 
look at or to talk to — but it was just a bit of simple 
humanity. It all came out. I had been good to him 
— I looked as if I were having a bad time. It was just 
a little human signal, and a beautiful one. It was 
there, then, all the time, I saw — human affection — if 



1 64 Father Payne 

I cared to put out my hand for it. I can't describe 
to you how it all developed, but my heart had melted 
somehow — thawed like a lump of ice. I saw that there 
was no specific ill-will to me in the world. I saw that 
everything was there, if I only chose to take it. That 
was my second awakening — a glimmer of light through 
a chink — and suddenly, it was day ! I had been growl- 
ing over bones and straw in a filthy kennel, and I was 
not really tied up at all. Life was running past me, 
a crystal river. I was dying of thirst : and all because 
it was not given me in a clean glass on a silver tray, 
I would not drink it — and God smiling at me all the 
time. " 

Father Payne walked on in silence. 

"The truth is, my boy," he said a minute later, 
"that I'm a converted man, and it isn't everyone 
who can say that — nor do I wish everyone to be con- 
verted, because it's a ghastly business preparing for the 
operation. It isn't everyone who needs it — only those 
self-willed, devilish, stand-off, proud people, who have 
to be braised in a mortar and pulverized to atoms. 
Then, when you are all to bits, you can be built 
up. Do you remember that stone we broke the other 
day? Well, I was a melted blob of stone, and then I 
was crystallized — now I'm full of eyes within! And 
the best of it is that they are little living eyes, and not 
sparkling flints — they see, they don't reflect ! At least 
I think so ; and I don't think trouble is brewing for me 
again — though that is always the danger!" 

I was very deeply moved by this, and said something 
about being grateful. 

"Oh, not that," said Father Payne; "you don't 
know what fun it has been to me to tell you. That's 
the sort of thing that I want to get into one of my 



Early Life 165 

novels, but I can't manage it. But the moral is, if 
I may say so: Be afraid of self-pity and dignity 
and self-respect — don't be afraid of happiness and 
simplicity and kindness. Give yourself away with 
both hands. It's easy for me to talk, because I have 
been loaded with presents ever since: the clouds drop 
fatness — a rich but expressive image that!" 



XXX 

OF BLOODSUCKERS 

I'M feeling low to-night," said Father Payne in 

1 answer to a question about his prolonged silence. 
"I'm not myself: virtue has gone out of me — I'm 
in the clutches of a bloodsucker." 

"Old debts with compound interest?" said Rose 
cheerfully. 

"Yes," said Father Payne with a frown; "old 
emotional I.O.U's. I didn't know what I was putting 
my name to. " 

"A man or a woman?" said Rose. 

"Thank God, it's a man!" said Father Payne. 
"Female bloodsuckers are worse still. A man, at 
all events, only wants the blood; a woman wants the 
pleasure of seeing you wince as well!" 

"It sounds very tragic," said Kaye. 

"No, it's not tragic," said Father Payne; "there 
would be something dignified about that! It's only 
unutterably low and degrading. Come, I'll tell you 
about it. It will do me good to get it off my chest. 

"It is one of my old pupils," Father Payne went 
on. "He once got into trouble about money, and 
I paid his debts — he can't forgive me that!" 

"Does he want you to pay some more? " said Rose. 

"Yes, he does," said Father Payne, "but he wants 
to be high-minded too. He wants me to press him to 
166 



Of Bloodsuckers 167 

take the money, to prevail upon him to accept it as a 
favour. He implies that if I hadn't begun by paying 
his debts originally, he would not have ever acquired 
what he calls 'the unhappy habit of dependence.' 
Of course he doesn't think that really: he wants the 
money, but he also wants to feel dignified. 'If I 
thought it would make you happier if I accepted it, ' 
he says, ' of course I should view the matter differently. 
It would give me a reason for accepting what I must 
confess would be a humiliation.' Isn't that infernal? 
Then he says that I may perhaps think that his 
troubles have coarsened him, but that he unhappily 
retains all his old sensitiveness. Then he goes on to 
say that it was I who encouraged him to preserve a 
high standard of delicacy in these matters." 

"He must be a precious rascal," said Vincent. 

"No, he isn't," said Father Payne, "that's the 
worst of it — but he is a frantic poseur. He has got so 
used to talking and thinking about his feelings, that 
he doesn't know what he really does feel. That's the 
part of it which bothers me : because if he was a mere 
hypocrite, I would say so plainly. One must not be 
taken in by apparent hypocrisy. It often represents 
what a man did once really think, but which has be- 
come a mere memory. One must not be hard on 
people's reminiscences. Don't you know how the 
mildest people are often disposed to make out that 
they were reckless and daring scapegraces at school? 
That isn't a lie; it is imagination working on very 
slender materials." 

We laughed at this, and then Barthrop said, "Let 
me write to him, Father. I won't be offensive. " 

"I know you wouldn't," said Father Payne; "but 
no one can help me. It's not my fault, but my mis- 



1 68 Father Payne 

fortune. It all comes of acting for the best. I ought 
to have paid his debts, and made myself thoroughly 
unpleasant about it. What I did was to be indulgent 
and sympathetic. It's all that accursed sentimen- 
tality that does it. I have been trying to write a 
letter to him all the morning, showing him up to him- 
self without being brutal. But he will only write 
back and say that I have made him miserable, and 
that I have wholly misunderstood him: and then I 
shall explain and apologize; and then he will take the 
money to show that he forgives me. I see a horrible 
vista of correspondence ahead. After four or five 
letters, I shall not have the remotest idea what it is all 
about, and he will be full of reproaches. He will say 
that it isn't the first time that he has found how the 
increase of wealth makes people ungenerous. Oh, 
don't I know every step of the way! He is going to 
have the money, and he is going to put me in the 
wrong: that is his plan, and it is going to come off. I 
shall be in the wrong : I feel in the wrong already ! ' ' 

"Then in that case there is certainly no necessity 
for losing the money too!" said Rose. 

"It's all very well for you to talk in that imper- 
sonal way, Rose," said Father Pajme. "Of course I 
know very well that you would handle the situation 
kindly and decisively; but you don't know what it is 
to suffer from politeness like a disease. I have done 
nothing wrong except that I have been polite when I 
might have been dry. I see right through the man, 
but he is absolutely impervious ; and it is my accursed 
politeness that makes it impossible for me to say 
bluntly what I know he will dislike and what he 
genuinely will not understand. I know what you are 
thinking, every one of you — that I say lots of things 



Of Bloodsuckers 169 

that you dislike — but then you do understand! I 
could no more tell this wretch the truth than I could 
trample on a blind old man. " 

"What will you really do?" said Barthrop. 

"I shall send him the money," said Father Payne 
firmly, "and I shall compliment him on his delicacy; 
and then, thank God, I shall forget, until it all begins 
again. I am a wretched old opportunist, of course; 
a sort of Ally Sloper — not fit company for strong and 



concise young men 



XXXI 

OF INSTINCTS 

1DO not remember what led to this remark of Father 
Payne's: — "It's a painful fact, from the ethical 
point of view, that qualities are more admired, and 
more beautiful indeed, the more instinctive they are. 
We don't admire the faculty of taking painsvery much. 
The industrious boy at school is rather disliked than 
otherwise, while the brilliant boy who can construe 
his lesson without learning it is envied. Take a virtue 
like courage : the love of danger, the contempt of fear, 
the power of dashing headlong into a thing without 
calculating the consequences is the kind of courage 
we admire. The person who is timid and anxious, and 
yet just manages desperately to screw himself up to 
the sticking-point, does not get nearly as much credit 
as the bold devil-may-care person. It is so with most 
performances; we admire ease and rapidity much 
more than perseverance and tenacity, what obviously 
costs little effort rather than what costs a great deal. 

"We all rather tend to be bored by a display of 
regularity and discipline. Do you remember that 
letter of Keats, where he confesses his intense irrita- 
tion at the way in which his walking companion, 
Brown, I think, always in the evening got out his 
writing-materials in the same order — first the paper, 
then the ink, then the pen. ' I say to him, ' says Keats, 
170 



Of Instincts 171 

'why not the pen sometimes first?' We don't like 
precision; look at the word 'Methodist,' which origi- 
nally was a nickname for people of strictly disciplined 
life. We like something a little more gay and in- 
consequent. 

"Yet the power of forcing oneself by an act of will 
to do something unpleasant is one of the finest qualities 
in the world. There is a story of a man who became a 
Bishop. He was a delicate and sensitive fellow, much 
affected by a crowd, and particularly by the sight of 
people passing in front of him. He began his work by 
holding an enormous confirmation, and five times in 
the course of it he actually had to retire to the vestry, 
where he was physically sick. That's a heroic per- 
formance; but we admire still more a bland and cheer- 
ful Bishop who is not sick, but enjoys a ceremony. " 

"Surely that is all right, Father Payne?" said 
Barthrop. "When we see a performance, we are 
concerned with appreciating the merit of it. A man 
with a bad headache, however gallant, is not likely 
to talk as well as a man in perfect health and high 
spirits; but if we are not considering the performance, 
but the virtues of the performer, we might admire 
the man who pumped up talk when he was feeling 
wretched more than the man from whom it flowed. " 

"The judicious Barthrop!" said Father Payne. 
"Yes, you are right — but for all that we do not in- 
stinctively admire effort as much as we admire easy 
brilliance. We are much more inclined to imitate 
the brilliant man than we are to imitate the man who 
has painfully developed an accomplishment. The 
truth is, we are all of us afraid of effort; and instinct 
is generally so much more in the right than reason, 
that I end by believing that it is better to live freely 



172 Father Payne 

in our good qualities, than painfully to conquer our 
bad qualities; not to take up work that we can't do 
from a sense of duty, but to take up work that we can 
do from a sense of pleasure. I believe in finding our 
real life more than in sticking to one that is not real for 
the sake of virtue. Trained inclination is the secret. 
That is why I should never make a soldier. I love 
being in a rage — no one more — it has all the advan- 
tages and none of the disadvantages of getting drunk. 
But I can't do it on the word of command. " 

"Isn't that what is called hedonism?" said Le- 
strange. 

"You must not get in the way of calling names!" 
said Father Payne ; ' ' hedonism is a word invented by 
Puritans to discourage the children of light. It is 
not a question of doing what you like, but of liking 
what you do. Of course everyone has got to choose — ■ 
you can't gratify all your impulses, because they 
thwart each other; but if you freely gratify your finer 
impulses, you will have much less temptation to in- 
dulge your baser inclinations. It is more important 
to have the steam up and to use the brake occasionally, 
than never to have the steam up at all. " 



XXXII 

OF HUMILITY 

WE had been listening to a paper by Kaye — a 
beautiful and fanciful piece of work; when he 
finished, Father Payne said: "That's a charming 
thing, Kaye — a little sticky in places, but still beauti- 
ful." 

"It's not so good as I had hoped," said Kaye 
mildly. 

"Oh, don't be humble," said Father Payne; "that's 
the basest of the virtues, because it vanishes the 
moment you realize it ! Make your bow like a man. 
It may not be as good as you hoped — nothing ever is 
— but surely it is better than you expected?" 

Kaye blushed, and said, "Well, yes, it is." 

"Now let me say generally," said Father Payne, 
"that in art you ought never to undervalue your 
own work. You ought all to be able to recognize 
how far you have done what you intended. The big 
men, like Tennyson and Morris, were always quite 
prepared to praise their own work. They did it quite 
modestly, more as if some piece of good fortune had 
befallen them than as if they deserved credit. There's 
no such thing as taking credit to oneself in art. What 
you try to do is always bound to be miles ahead of what 
you can do — that is where the humility comes in. 
But a man who can't admire his own work on occa- 
i73 



174 Father Payne 

sions, can't admire any one's work. If you do a really 
good thing, you ought to feel as if you had been digging 
for diamonds and had found a big one. Hang it, you 
intend to make a fine thing ! You are not likely to be 
conceited about it, because you can't make a beautiful 
thing every day; and the humiliation comes in when 
after turning out a good thing, you find yourself 
turning out a row of bad ones. The only artists who 
are conceited are those who can't distinguish between 
what is good and what is inferior in their own work. 
You must not expect much praise, and least of all 
from other artists, because no artist is ever very 
deeply interested in another artist's work, except in 
the work of the two or three who can do easily what he 
is trying to do. But it is a deep pleasure, which may 
be frankly enjoyed, to turn out a fine bit of work; 
though you must not waste much time over enjoying 
it, because you have got to go on to the next. " 

"I always think it must be very awful," said 
Vincent, "when it dawns upon a man that his mind is 
getting stiff and his faculty uncertain, and that he is 
not doing good work any more. What ought people 
to do about stopping?" 

" It's very hard to say, " said Father Payne. " The 
happiest thing of all is, I expect, to die before that 
comes; and the next best thing is to know when to 
stop and to want to stop. But many people get a 
habit of work, and fall into dreariness without it." 

"Isn't it better to go on with the delusion that you 
are just as good as ever — like Wordsworth and Brown- 
ing?" said Rose. 

"No, I don't think that is better," said Father 
Payne, "because it means a sort of blindness. It is 
very curious in the case of Browning, because he 



Of Humility 175 

learned exactly how to do things. He had his method, 
he fixed upon an abnormal personality or a curious 
incident, and he turned it inside out with perfect 
fidelity. But after a certain time in his life, the thing 
became suddenly heavy and uninteresting. Some- 
thing evaporated — I do not know what! The trick 
is done just as deftly, but one is bored; one simply 
doesn't care to see the inside of a new person, however 
well dissected. There's no life, no beauty about the 
later things. Wordsworth is somehow different — he is 
always rather noble and prophetic. The later poems 
are not beautiful, but they issue from a beautiful 
idea — a passion of some kind. But the later Browning 
poems are not passionate — they remind one of a sur- 
geon tucking up his sleeves for a set of operations. I 
expect that Browning was too humble; he loved a 
gentlemanly convention, and Wordsworth certainly 
did not do that. If you want to know how a poet 
should live, read Dorothy Wordsworth's journals at 
Grasmere ; if you want to know how he should feel, 
read the letters of Keats. " 



XXXIII 



OF MEEKNESS 



1HAD been having some work looked over by Father 
Payne, who had been somewhat trenchant. "You 
have been beating a broken drum, you know," he 
had said, with a smile. 

"Yes," I said. "It's poor stuff, I see. But I 
didn't know it was so bad when I wrote it; I thought 
I was making the best of a poor subject rather in- 
geniously. I am afraid I am rather stupid. " 

"If I thought you really felt like that, " said Father 
Payne, "I should be sorry for you. But I expect it 
is only your idea of modesty?" 

"No," I said, "it isn't modesty — it's humility, 
I think. " 

" No one has any business to think himself humble, " 
said Father Payne. "The moment you do that, 
you are conceited. It's not a virtue to grovel. A 
man ought to know exactly what he is worth. You 
needn't be always saying what you are worth, of 
course. It's modest to hold your tongue. But 
humility is, or ought to be, extinct as a virtue. It 
belongs to the time when people felt bound to deplore 
the corruption of their heart, and to speak of them- 
selves as worms, and to compare themselves despond- 
ently with God. That in itself is a piece of insolence ; 
and it isn't a wholesome frame of mind to dwell on 
176 



Of Meekness 177 

one's worthlessness, and to speak of one's righteous- 
ness as filthy rags. It removes every stimulus to 
effort. If you really feel like that, you had better 
take to your bed permanently — you will do less harm 
there than pretending to do work in the value of which 
you don't believe. " 

"But what is the word for the feeling which one 
has when one reads a really splendid book, let us 
say, or hears a perfect piece of music? " I said. 

"Well, it ought to be gratitude and admiration," 
said Father Payne. "Why mix yourself up with 
it at all?" 

"Because I can't help it," I said; "I think of the 
way in which I muddle on with my writing, and I feel 
how hopeless I am." 

"That's all wrong, my boy," said Father Payne; 
"you ought to say to yourself — 'So that is his way 
of putting things and, by Jove, it's superb. Now 
I've got to find my way of putting things!' You had 
better go and work in the fields like an honest man, 
if you don't feel you have got anything to say worth 
saying. You have your own point of view, you know: 
try and get it down on paper. It isn't exactly the 
same as, let us say, Shakespeare's point of view: but 
if you feel that he has seen everything worth seeing, 
and said everything worth saying, then, of course, it is 
no good going on. But that is pure grovelling; no 
lively person ever does feel that — he says, 'Hang it, 
he has left some things out!' After all, everyone has 
a right to his point of view, and if it can be expressed, 
why, it is worth expressing. We want all the side- 
lights we can get." 

"That's one comfort!" I said. 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but you know per- 



i7 8 Father Payne 

fectly well that you knew it before I told you. Why 
be so undignified? You need not want to astonish or 
amuse the whole civilized world. You probably won't 
do that ; but you can fit a bit of the mosaic in, if you 
have it in you. Now look you here ! I know exactly 
what I am worth. I can't write — though I think I 
can when I'm at it — but I can perceive, and see when 
a thing is amiss, and lay my finger on a fault; I can 
be of some use to a fellow like yourself — and I can 
manage an estate in my own way, and I can keep my 
tenants' spirits up. I have got a perfectly definite use 
in the world, and I'm going to play my part for all that 
I'm worth. I'm not going to pretend that I am a 
worm or an outcast — I don't feel one; and I am as sure 
as I can be of anything, that God does not wish me to 
feel one. He needs me; He can't get on without me 
just here ; and when He can, He will say the word. I 
don't think I am of any far-reaching significance: but 
neither am I going to say that I am nothing but vile 
earth and a miserable sinner. I'm lazy, I'm cross, 
I'm unkind, I'm greedy: but I know when I am 
wasting time and temper, and I don't do it all the time. 
It's no use being abject. The mistake is to go about 
comparing yourself with other people and weighing 
yourself against them. The right thing to do is to 
be able to recognize generously and desirously when 
you see any one doing something finely which you do 
badly, and to say, 'Come, that's the right way! I 
must do better. ' But to be humble is to be grubby, 
because it makes one proud, in a nasty sort of way, 
of doing things badly. 'What a poor creature I am, ' 
says the humble man, 'and how nice to know that I 
am so poor a creature; how noble and unworldly I am. ' 
The mistake is to want to do a thing better than 



Of Meekness 179 

Smith or Jones : the right way is to want to do it better 
than yourself. " 

"Yes," I said, "that's perfectly true, Father: and 
I won't be such a fool again." 

"You haven't been a fool, so far as I am aware," 
said Father Payne. "It is only that you are just a 
thought too polite. You mustn't be polite in mind, 
you know — only in manners. Politeness only con- 
sists in not saying all you think unless you are asked. 
But humility consists in trying to believe that you 
think less than you think. It's like holding your nose, 
and saying that the bad smell has gone — it is playing 
tricks with your mind : and if you get into the way of 
doing that, you will find that your mind has a nasty 
way of playing tricks upon you. Here! hold on! I 
am rapidly becoming like Chadband! Send me Vin- 
cent, will you — there's a good man? He comes next. " 



XXXIV 

OF CRITICISM 

FATHER PAYNE had told me that my writing 
was becoming too juicy and too highly-scented. 
"You mustn't hide the underlying form," he said; 
"have plenty of plain spaces. This sort of writing is 
only for readers who want to be vaguely soothed and 
made to feel comfortable by a book — it's a stimulant, 
it's not a food!" 

"Yes," I said with a sigh, "I suppose you are 
right." 

"Up to a certain point, I am right," he replied, 
"because you are in training at present — and people 
in training have to do abnormal things: you can't 
live as if you were in training, of course ; but when 
you begin to work on your own account, you must 
find your own pace and your own manner: and even 
now you needn't agree with me unless you like. " 

I determined, however, that I would give him 
something very different next time. He suggested 
that I should write an essay on a certain writer of 
fiction. I read the novels with great care, and I 
then produced the driest and most technical criticism 
I could. I read it aloud to Father Payne a month 
later. He heard it in silence, stroking his beard with 
his left hand, as his manner was. When I had finished 
he said: "Well, you have taken my advice with a 
180 . 



Of Criticism 181 

vengeance; and as an exercise — indeed, as a tour-de- 
force — it is good. I didn't think you had it in you to 
produce such a bit of anatomy. I think it's simply 
the most uninteresting essay I ever heard in my life — ■ 
chip, chip, chip, the whole time. It won't do you any 
harm to have written it, but, of course, it's a mere 
caricature. No conceivable reason could be assigned 
for your writing it. It's like the burial of the dead — 
ashes to ashes, dust to dust!" 

"I admit, " I said, "that I did it on purpose, to show 
you how judicious I could be. " 

"Oh, yes," he said, "I quite realize that — and 
that's why I admire it. If you had produced it as a 
real thing, and not by way of reprisal, I should think 
very ill of your prospects. It's like the work of an 
analytical chemist — I tell you what it's like, it's like 
the diagnosis of the symptoms of some sick person of 
rank in a doctor's case-book! But, of course, you 
know you mustn't write like that, as well as I do. 
There must be some motive for writing, some touch 
of admiration and sympathy, something you can 
show to other people which might escape them, and 
which is worth while for them to see. In writing — ■ 
at present, at all events — one can't be so desperately 
scientific and technical as all that. I suppose that 
some day, when we treat human thought and psy- 
chology scientifically, we shall have to dissect like that; 
but even so, it will be in the interests of science, not 
in the interests of literature. One must not confuse 
the two, and no doubt, when we begin to analyse the 
development of human thought, its heredity, its 
genesis and growth, we shall have a Shelley-culture 
in a test-tube, and we shall be able to isolate a Brown- 
ing-germ: but we haven't got there yet." 



1 82 Father Payne 

"In that case," I said, "I don't really see what 
was so wrong with my last essay." 

"Why, it was a mere extemporization, " said Father 
Payne; "a phrase suggested a phrase, a word evoked 
a lot of other words — there was no real connection of 
thought. It was pretty enough, but you were not 
even roving from one place to another, you were just 
drifting with the stream. Now this last essay is 
purely business-like. You have analysed the points — 
but there's no beauty or pleasure in it. It is simply 
what an engineer might say to an engineer about the 
building of a bridge. Mind, I am not finding fault 
with your essay. You did what you set out to do, and 
you have done it well. I only say there is not any 
conceivable reason why it should have been written, 
and there is every conceivable reason why it should 
not be read." 

"It was just an attempt, " I said, "to see the points 
and to disentangle them. " 

"Yes, yes," said Father Payne; "I see that, and 
I give you full credit for it. But, after all, you must 
look on writing as a species of human communication. 
The one reason for writing is that the writer sees 
something which other people overlook, perceives the 
beauty and interest of it, gets behind it, sees the 
quality of it, and how it differs from other similar 
things. If the writer is worth anything, his subject 
must be so interesting or curious or beautiful to him- 
self that he can't help setting it down. The motive 
of it all must be the fact that he is interested — not 
the hope of interesting other people. You must risk 
that, though the more you are interested, the better 
is your chance of interesting others. Then the next 
point is that things mustn't be presented in a cold and 



Of Criticism 183 

abstract light — you have done that here — it must be 
done as you see it, not as a photographic plate records 
it : and that is where the personality of the artist comes 
in, and where writers are handicapped, according as 
they have or have not a personal charm. That is 
the unsolved mystery of writing — the personal charm : 
apart from that there is little in it. A man may see a 
thing with hideous distinctness, but he may not be 
able to invest it with charm : and the danger of charm 
is that some people can invest very shallow, muddled, 
and shabby thinking with a sort of charm. It is like 
a cloak, if I may say so. If I wear an old cloak, it 
looks shabby and disgraceful, as it is. But if I lend 
it to a shapely and well-made friend, it gets a beauty 
from the wearer. There are men I know who can tell 
me a story as old as the hills, and yet make it fresh 
and attractive. Look at that delicious farrago of 
nonsense and absurdity, Ruskin's Fors Clavigera. He 
crammed in anything that came into his head — his 
reminiscences, scraps out of old dreary books he had 
read, paragraphs snipped out of the papers. There's 
no order, no sequence about it, and yet it is irresistible. 
But then Ruskin had the charm, and managed to pour 
it into all that he wrote. He is always there, that 
whimsical, generous, perverse, affectionate, afflicted, 
pathetic creature, even in the smallest scrap of a letter 
or the dreariest old tag of quotation. But you and 
I can't play tricks like that. You are sometimes 
there, I confess, in what you write, while I am never 
there in anything that I write. What I want to teach 
you to do is to be really yourself in all that you write. " 

"But isn't it apt to be very tiresome," said I, "if 
the writer is always obtruding himself?" 

"Yes, if he obtrudes himself, of course he is tire- 



1 84 Father Payne 

some," said Father Payne. "But look at Ruskin 
again. I imagine, from all that I read about him, that 
if he was present at a gathering, he was the one person 
whom everyone wanted to hear. If he was sulky or 
silent, it was everyone's concern to smoothe him down 
— if only he would talk. What you must learn to do 
is to give exactly as much of yourself as people want. 
But it must be a transfusion of yourself, not a pre- 
sentment. I don't imagine that Ruskin always talked 
about himself — he talked about what interested him, 
and because he saw five times as much as any one else 
saw in a picture, and about three times as much as 
was ever there, it was fascinating: but the primary 
charm was in Ruskin himself. Don't you know the 
curious delight of seeing a house once inhabited by 
anyone whom one has much admired and loved? 
However dull and commonplace it is, you keep on 
saying to yourself, ' That was what his eyes rested on, 
those were the books he handled; how could he bear 
to have such curtains, how could he endure that wall- 
paper ? ' The most hideous things become interesting, 
because he tolerated them. In writing, all depends 
upon how much of what is interesting, original, em- 
phatic, charming in yourself you can communicate 
to what you are writing. It has got to live; that is the 
secret of the commonplace and even absurd books 
which reviewers treat with contempt, and readers 
buy in thousands. They have life! " 

"But that is very far from being art, isn't it?" 
I said. 

"Of course!" said Father Payne, "but the use 
of art, as I understand it, is just that — that all you 
present shall have life, and that you should learn not 
to present what has not got life. Why I objected to 



Of Criticism 185 

your last essay was because you were not alive in it : 
you were just echoing and repeating things: you 
seemed to me to be talking in your sleep. Why I 
object to this essay is that you are too wide awake — • 
you are just talking shop. " 

" I confess I rather despair, " I said. 

"What rubbish!" said Father Payne; "all I want 
you to do is to live in your ideas — make them your 
own, don't just slop them down without having under- 
stood or felt them. I'll tell you what you shall do 
next. You shall just put aside all this dreary collec- 
tion of formulae and scalpel-work, and you shall write 
me an essay on the whole subject, saying the best that 
you feel about it all, not the worst that a stiff intelli- 
gence can extract from it. Don't be pettish about it! 
I assure you I respect your talent very much. I 
didn't think it was in you to produce anything so 
loathsomely judicious." 



XXXV 

OF THE SENSE OF BEAUTY 

THERE had been some vague ethical discussion 
during dinner in which Father Payne had not 
intervened; but he suddenly joined in briskly, though 
I don't remember who or what struck the spark 
out. "You are running logic too hard," he said; 
"the difficulty with all morality is not to know where 
it is to begin, but where it is to stop. " 

"I didn't know it had to stop," said Vincent; "I 
thought it had to go on." 

"Yes, but not as morality," said Father Payne; 
"as instinct and feeling — only very elementary peo- 
ple indeed obey rules, because they are rules. The 
righteous man obeys them because on the whole he 
agrees with them. " 

"But in one sense it isn't possible to be too good?" 
said Vincent. 

"No, " said Father Payne, "not if you are sure what 
good is — but it is quite easy to be too righteous, to 
have too many rules and scruples — not to live your 
own life at all, but an anxious, timid, broken-winged 
sort of life, like some of the fearful saints in the 
Pilgrim's Progress, who got no fun out of the business 
at all. Don't you remember what Mr. Feeblemind 
says? I can't quote — it's a glorious passage." 

Barthrop slipped out and fetched a Pilgrim's Pro- 
186 



Of the Sense of Beauty 187 

gress, which he put over Father Payne's shoulder. 
"Thank you, old man," said Father Payne, "that's 
very kind of you — that is morality translated into 
feeling!" 

He turned over the pages, and read the bit in his 
resonant voice: 

"'I am, as I said, a man of a weak and feeble 
mind, and shall be offended and made weak at that 
which others can bear. I shall like no Laughing: 
I shall like no gay Attire: I shall like no unprofitable 
Questions. Nay, I am so weak a man, as to be 
offended with that which others have a liberty to do. 
I do not know all the truth: I am a very ignorant 
Christian man; sometimes, if I hear some rejoice in 
the Lord, it troubles me, because I cannot do so too. ' " 

"There," he said, "that's very good writing, you 
know — full of freshness — but you are not meant to 
admire the poor soul: that's not the way to go on pil- 
grimage! There is something wrong with a man's 
religion, if it leaves him in that state. I don't mean 
that to be happy is always a sign of grace — it often 
is simply a lack of sympathy and imagination; but 
to be as good as Mr. Feeblemind, and at the same time 
as unhappy, is a clear sign that something is wrong. 
He is like a dog that will try to get through a narrow 
gap with a stick in his mouth — he can't make out why 
he can't do his duty and bring the stick — it catches on 
both sides, and won't let him through. , He knows it 
is his business to bring the thing back at once, but he 
is prevented in some mysterious way. It doesn't 
occur to him to put the stick down, get through him- 
self, and then pull it through by the end. That is 
why our duty is often so hard, because we think we 
ought to do it simply and directly, when it really wants 



1 88 Father Payne 

a little adjusting — we regard the momentary precept, 
not the ultimate principle. " 

"But what is to tell us where to draw the line," 
said Vincent, "and when to disregard the precept?" 

"Ah," said Father Payne, "that's my great dis- 
covery, which no one else will ever recognize — that 
is where the sense of beauty comes in!" 

"I don't see that the sense of beauty has anything 
to do with morality, " said Vincent. 

"Ah, but that is because you are at heart a Puri- 
tan," said Father Payne; "and the mistake of all 
Puritans is to disregard the sense of beauty — all the 
really great saints have felt about morality as an artist 
feels about beauty. They don't do good things be- 
cause they are told to do them, but because they feel 
them to be beautiful, splendid, attractive; and they 
avoid having anything to do with evil things, because 
such things are ugly and repellent." 

"But when you have to do a thoroughly disagree- 
able thing, " said Vincent, "there often isn't anything 
beautiful about it either way. I'll give you a small 
instance. Some months ago I had been engaged for 
a fortnight to go to a thoroughly dull dinner-party 
with some dreary relations of mine, and a man asked 
me to come and dine at his club and meet George 
Meredith, whom I would have given simply anything 
to meet. Of course I couldn't do it — I had to go on 
with the other thing. I had to do what I hated, with- 
out the smallest hope of being anything but fearfully 
bored: and I had to give up doing what would have 
interested me more than anything in the world. Of 
course, that is only a small instance, but it will 
suffice." 

"It all depends on how you behaved at your 



Of the Sense of Beauty 189 

dinner-party when you got there, " said Father Payne, 
smiling; "were you sulky and cross, or were you civil 
and decent?" 

"I don't know," said Vincent; "I expect I was 
pretty much as usual. After all, it wasn't their 
fault!" 

"You are all right, my boy," said Father Payne; 
"you have got the sense of beauty right enough, 
though you probably call it by some uncomfortable 
name. I won't make you blush by praising you, 
but I give you a good mark for the whole affair. If 
you had excused yourself, or asked to be let off, or 
told a lie, it would have been ugly. What you did was 
in the best taste: and that is what I mean. The ugly 
thing is to clutch and hold on. You did more for 
yourself by being polite and honest than even George 
Meredith could have done for you. What I mean by 
the sense of beauty, as applied to morality, is that a 
man must be a gentleman first, and a moralist after- 
wards, if he can. It is grabbing at your own sense of 
righteousness, if you use it to hurt other people. Your 
own complacency of conscience is not as important 
as the duty of not making other people uncomfortable. 
Of course there are occasions when it is right to stand 
up to a moral bully, and then you may go for him for 
all you are worth : but these cases are rare ; and what 
you must not do is to get into the way of a sort of 
moral skirmishing. In ordinary life, people draw 
their lines in slightly different places according to 
preference: you must allow for temperament. You 
mustn't interfere with other people's codes, unless you 
are prepared to be interfered with. It is impossible 
to be severely logical. Take a thing like the use of 
money: it is good to be generous, but you mustn't 



190 Father Payne 

give away what you can't afford, because then your 
friends have to pay your bills. What everyone needs 
is something to tell him when he must begin practising 
a virtue, and when to stop practising it. You may 
say that common-sense does that. Well, I don't 
think it does! I know sensible people who do very 
brutal things: there must be something finer than 
common-sense : it must be a mixture of sense and sym- 
pathy and imagination, and delicacy and humour and 
tact — and I can't find a better way of expressing it 
than to call it a sense of beauty, a faculty of judging 
in a fine, sweet-tempered, gentle, quiet way, with a 
sort of instinctive prescience as to where the ripples of 
what you do and say will spread to, and what sort 
of effect they will produce. That's the right sort of 
virtue — attractive virtue — which makes other people 
wish to behave likewise. I don't say that a man who 
lives like that can avoid suffering: he suffers a good 
deal, because he sees ugly things going on all about 
him; but he doesn't cause suffering — unless he intends 
to — and even so he doesn't like doing it. He is never 
spiteful or jealous. He often makes mistakes, but he 
recognizes them. He doesn't erect barriers between 
himself and other people. He isn't always exactly 
popular, because many people hate superiority when- 
ever they see it : but he is trusted and loved and even 
taken advantage of, because he doesn't go in for re- 
prisals. " 

"But if you haven't got this sense of beauty," said 
Vincent, "how are you to get it?" 

"By admiring it," said Father Payne. "I don't 
say that the people who have got it are conscious 
of it — in fact they are generally quite unconscious of 
it. Do you remember what Shelley — who was, I 



Of the Sense of Beauty 191 

think, one of the people who had the sense of beauty 
as strongly as anyone who ever lived — what he said 
to Hogg, when Hogg told him how he had shut up an 
impertinent young ruffian? 'I wish I could be as 
exclusive as you are, ' said Shelley with a sigh, feeling, 
no doubt, a sense of real failure — 'but I cannot!' 
Shelley's weakness was a much finer thing than Hogg's 
strength. I don't say that Shelley was perfect: his 
imagination ran away with him to an extent that may 
be called untruthful; he idealized people, and then 
threw them over when he discovered them to be futile ; 
but that is the right kind of mistake to make: the 
wrong kind of mistake is to see people too clearly, and 
to take for granted that they are not as delightful as 
they seem. ' ' 

"You mean that if one must choose, " said Vincent, 
"it is better to be a fool than a knave. " 

"Why, of course," said Father Payne; "but don't 
call it 'a fool' — call it 'a child': that's the kind of 
beauty I mean, the unsuspicious, guileless, trustful, 
affectionate temper — that to begin with: and you 
must learn, as you go on, a quality which the child 
has not always got — a sense of humour. That is 
what experience ought to give you — a power, that is, 
of seeing what is really there, and of being more 
amused than shocked by it. That helps you to dis- 
tinguish real knavishness from childish faults. A 
great many of the absurd, perverse, unkind, unpleas- 
ant things which people do are not knavish at all 
— they are silly, selfish little diplomacies, guileless 
obedience to conventions, unreasonable deference to 
imaginary authority. People don't mean any harm 
by such tricks — they are the subterfuges of weakness : 
but when you come upon real cynical deliberate knav- 



192 Father Payne 

ishness — that is different. There's nothing amusing 
about that. But you must be indulgent to weakness, 
and only severe with strength." 

" I'm getting a little confused, " said Vincent. 

"Not as much as I am," said Father Payne; "I 
don't know where I have got to, I am sure. I seem 
to have changed hares! But one thing does emerge, 
and that is, that a sort of inspired good taste is the only 
thing which can regulate morals. The root of all 
morals is ultimately beauty. Why are we not a 1 
as greedy and dirty as the old cave-men? For the 
simple reason that something, for which he was not 
responsible, began to work in the cave-man's mind. 
He said to himself, 'This is not the way to behave: 
it would be nicer not to have killed Mary when I was 
angry. ' And then, when that impulse is once started, 
human beings go too fast, and want to carry out their 
new discoveries of rules and principles too far: and 
you must have a regulating force : and if you can find 
a better force than the instinct for what is beautiful, 
tell me, and I'll undertake to talk for at least as long 
about it. I must stop! My sense of beauty warns 
me that I am becoming a bore. " 



XXXVI 



OF BIOGRAPHY 



FATHER PAYNE broke out suddenly after dinner 
to two or three of us about a book he had been 
reading. 

"It's called a Life," he said, "at the top of every 
page almost. I don't wonder the author felt it neces- 
sary to remind you — or perhaps he was reminding 
himself? I can see him, " said Father Payne, "saying 
to himself with a rueful expression, 'This is a Life 
undoubtedly!' Why, the waxworks of Madame 
Tussaud are models of vivacity and agility compared 
to it. I never set eyes on such a book!" 

"Why on earth did you go on reading it?" said I. 

"Well may you ask!" said Father Payne. "It's one 
of my weaknesses; if I begin a book, I can put it down 
if it is moderately good ; but if it is either very good or 
very bad, I can't get out of it — I feel like a wasp in a 
honey-pot. I make faint sticky motions of flight — 
but on I go." 

"Whose life was it?" I said, laughing. 

"I hardly know," said Father Payne. "It leaves 
on my mind the impression of his having been a 
decent old party enough. I think he must have been 
a general merchant — he seems to have had pretty 
nearly everything on hand. He wrote books, I 
gather"; and Father Payne groaned. 

13 193 



194 Father Payne 

"What were they about?" I said. 

"I don't know, I'm sure," said Father Payne. 
"History and stuff — literary essays, and people's 
influence, perhaps. He went in for accounting for 
things, I fancy, and explaining things away. There 
were extracts which alienated my attention faster 
than any extracts I ever read. I could not keep my 
mind on them. God preserve me from ever falling in 
with any of his books ; I should spend days in reading 
them! He travelled too — he was always travelling. 
Why couldn't he leave Europe alone? He has left 
his trail all over Europe, like a snail. He has defiled 
all the finest scenery on the Continent. But, by 
Jove, he met his match in his biographer; he has been 
accounted for all right. And yet I feel that it was 
rather hard on him. If he could have held his tongue 
about things in general, and if his biographer could 
have had his tongue about him, it would have been 
all right. He did no harm, so far as I can make out 
— he was honest and upright; he would have done 
very well as a trustee. " 

Father Payne stopped, and looked round with a 
melancholy air. "I have gathered," he said, "after 
several hours' reading, three interesting facts about 
him. The first is that he wore rather loud checks — ■ 
I liked that — I detected a touch of vanity in that. 
The second is that he was fond of quoting poetry, and 
the moment he did so, his voice became wholly in- 
audible from emotion — that's a good touch. And the 
third is that, if he had a guest staying with him, he 
used to talk continuously in the smoking-room, light 
his candle, go on talking, walk away talking — by Jove, 
I can hear him doing it — all up the stairs, along the 
passage to his bedroom — talk, talk, talk — in they 



Of Biography 195 

went — then he used to begin to undress — no escape — 
I can hear his voice muffled as he pulled off his shirt 
— off went his socks — talking still — then he would ac- 
tually get into bed — more explanations, more quota- 
tions. I wonder how the guest got away; that isn't 
related — in the intervals of an inaudible quotation, 
perhaps? What do you think?" 

We exploded in laughter, in which Father Payne 
joined. Then he said: "But look here, you know, 
it's not really a joke — it's horribly serious! A man 
ought really to be prosecuted for writing such a book. 
That is the worst of English people, that they have 
no idea who deserves a biography and who does not. 
It isn't enough to be a rich man, or a public man, or a 
man of virtue. No one ought to be written about, 
simply because he has done things. He must be 
content with that. No one should have a biography 
unless he was either beautiful or picturesque or absurd, 
just as no one should have a portrait painted unless 
he is one of the three. Now this poor fellow — I dare- 
say there were people who loved him — think what their 
feelings must be at seeing him stuffed and set up like 
this! A biography must be a work of art — it ought 
not to be a post-dated testimonial! Most of us are 
only fit, when we have finished our work, to go straight 
into the waste-paper basket. The people who deserve 
biographies are the vivid, rich, animated natures who 
lived life with zest and interest. There are a good 
many such men, who can say vigorous, shrewd, lively, 
fresh things in talk, but who cannot express themselves 
in writing. The curse of most biographies is the 
letters; not many people can write good letters, and 
yet it becomes a sacred duty to pad a Life out with 
dull and stodgy documents; it is all so utterly inartistic 



196 Father Payne 

and decorous and stupid. A biography ought to be 
well seasoned with faults and foibles. That is the one 
encouraging thing about life, that a man can have 
plenty of failings and still make a fine business out of 
it all. Yet it is regarded as almost treacherous to 
hint at imperfections. Now if I had had our friend 
the general merchant to biographize, I would have 
taken careful notes of his talk while undressing — 
there's something picturesque about that! I would 
have told how he spent his day, how he looked and 
moved, ate and drank. A real portrait of an uninter- 
esting man might be quite a treasure. " 

"Yes, but you know it wouldn't do, " said Barthrop; 
"his friends would be out at you like a swarm of 
wasps. " 

"Oh, I know that," said Father Payne. "It is 
all this infernal sentimentality which spoils everything; 
as long as we think of the dead as elderly angels hover- 
ing over us while we pray, there is nothing to be done. 
If we really believe that we migrate out of life into an 
atmosphere of mild piety, and lose all our individual- 
ity at once, then, of course, the less said the better. 
As long as we hold that, then death must remain as the 
worst of catastrophes for everyone concerned. The 
result of it all is that a bad biography is the worst of 
books, because it quenches our interest in life, and 
makes life insupportably dull. The first point is that 
the biographer is infinitely more important than his 
subject. Look what an enchanting book Carlyle 
made out of the Life of Sterling. Sterling was a man 
of real charm who could only talk. He couldn't 
write a line. His writings are pitiful. Carlyle put 
them all aside with a delicious irony; and yet he 
managed to depict a swift, restless, delicate, radiant 



Of Biography 197 

creature, whom one loves and admires. It is one 
of the loveliest books ever written. But, on the other 
hand, there are hundreds of fine creatures who have 
been hopelessly buried for ever and ever under their 
biographies — the sepulchre made sure, the stone sealed, 
and the watch set. " 

"But there are some good biographies?" said 
Barthrop. 

"About a dozen," said Father Payne. "I won't 
give a list of them, or I should become like our friend 
the merchant. I feel it coming on, by Jove — I feel 
like accounting for things and talking you all up to my 
bedroom." 

"But what can be done about it all?" I said. 

"Nothing whatever, my boy," said Father Payne; 
"as long as people are not really interested in life, 
but in money and committees, there is nothing to be 
done. And as long as they hold things sacred, 
which means a strong dislike of the plain truth, it's 
hopeless. If a man is prepared to write a really 
veracious biography, he must also be prepared to fly 
for his life and to change his name. Public opinion 
is for sentiment and against truth; and you must 
change public opinion. But, oh dear me, when I 
think of the fascination of real personality, and the 
waste of good material, and the careful way in which 
the pious biographer strains out all the meat and leaves 
nothing but a thin and watery decoction, I could weep 
over the futility of mankind. The dread of being 
interesting or natural, the adoration of pomposity and 
full dress, the sickening love of romance, the hatred of 
reality — oh, it's a deplorable world!" 



XXXVII 

OF POSSESSIONS 

" T WONDER," said Father Payne one day at dinner, 
I "whether any nation's proverbs are such a dis- 
grace to them as our national proverbs are to us. Ours 
are horribly Anglo-Saxon and characteristic. They 
seem to me to have been all invented by a shrewd, 
selfish, complacent, suspicious old farmer, in a very 
small way of business, determined that he will not 
be overreached, and equally determined, too, that 
he will take full advantage of the weakness of others. 
1 Charity begins at home,' ' Possession is nine points of 
the law, ' ' Don't count your chickens before they are 
hatched,' 'When poverty comes in at the door, love 
flies out of the window.' They are all equally dis- 
graceful. They deride all emotion, they despise 
imagination, they are unutterably low and hard, and 
what is called sensible; they are frankly unchristian 
as well as ungentlemanly. No wonder we are called a 
nation of shopkeepers." 

"But aren't we a great deal better than our pro- 
verbs?" said Barthrop: "do they really express 
anything more than a contempt for weakness and 
sentiment?" 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but I don't like them 
any better for that. Why should we be ashamed of 
all our better feelings? I admit that we have a sense 
198 



Of Possessions 199 

of justice ; but that only means that we care for mate- 
rial possessions so much that we are afraid not to ad- 
mit that others have the right to do the same. The 
real obstacle to socialism in England is the sense of 
sanctity about a man's savings. The moment that a 
man has saved a few pounds, he agrees to any legis- 
lation that allows him to hold on to them." 

"But aren't we, behind all that," said Barthrop, 
"an intensely sentimental nation?" 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but that's a fault 
really — we don't believe in real justice, only in pic- 
turesque justice. We are hopeless individualists. 
We melt into tears over a child that is lost, or a dog 
that howls; and we let all sorts of evil systems and 
arrangements grow and flourish. We can't think 
algebraically, only arithmetically. We can be kind 
to a single case of hardship; we can't take in a wide- 
spread system of oppression. We are improving 
somewhat; but it is always the particular case that 
affects us, and not the general principle. " 

"But to go back to our sense of possession, " I said, 
"is that really much more than a matter of climate? 
Does it mean more than this, that we, in a temperate 
climate inclining to cold, need more elaborate houses 
and more heat-producing food than nations who live 
in warmer climates ? Are not the nations who live in 
warmer climates less attached to material things 
simply because they are less important? " 

"There is something in that, no doubt," said 
Father Payne. "Of course, where nature is more 
hostile to life, men will have to work longer hours to 
support life than where 'the spicy breezes blow soft 
o'er Ceylon's isle.' But it isn't that of which I com- 
plain — it is the awful sense of respectability attaching 



200 Father Payne 

to possessions, the hideous way in which we fill our 
houses with things which we do not want or use, just 
because they are a symbol of respectability. We like 
hoarding, and we like luxuries, not because we enjoy 
them, but because we like other people to know that 
we can pay for them. I do not imagine that there is 
any nation in the world whose hospitality differs so 
much from the mode in which people actually live as 
ours does. In a sensible society, if we wanted to see 
our friends, we should ask them to bring their cold 
mutton round, and have a picnic. What we do ac- 
tually do is to have a meal which we can't afford, and 
which our guests know is not in the least like our or- 
dinary meals; and then we expect to be asked back to 
a similarly ostentatious banquet." 

"But isn't there something," said Barthrop, "in 
Dr. Johnson's dictum, that a meal was good enough to 
eat, but not good enough to ask a man to? Isn't it 
a good impulse to put your best before a guest ? ' ' 

"Oh, no doubt," said Father Payne, "but there's 
a want of simplicity about it if you only want to 
entertain people in order that they may see you do it, 
and not because you want to see them. It's vulgar, 
somehow — that's what I suspect our nation of being. 
Our inability to speak frankly of money is another 
sign. We do money too much honour by being so 
reticent about it. The fact is that it is the one sacred 
subject among us. People are reticent about religion 
and books and art, because they are not sure that 
other people are interested in them. But they are 
reticent about money as a matter of duty, because they 
are sure that everyone is deeply interested. People 
talk about money with nods and winks and hints — 
those are all the signs of a sacred mystery!" 



Of Possessions 201 

"Well, I wonder," said Barthrop, "whether we 
are as base as you seem to think ! ' ' 

"I will tell you when I will change my mind," said 
Father Payne; "all the talk of noble aims and strong 
purposes will not deceive me. What would convert 
me would be if I saw generous giving a custom so 
common that it hardly excited remark. You see a 
few generous wills — but even then a will which leaves 
money to public purposes is generally commented upon ; 
and it almost always means, too, if you look into it, 
that a man has had no near relations, and that he has 
stuck to his money and the power it gives him during 
his life. If I could see a few cases of men impoverish- 
ing themselves and their families in their lifetime for 
public objects; if I saw evidence of men who have 
heaped up wealth content to let their children start 
again in the race, and determined to support the State 
rather than the family; if I could hear of a rich 
man's children beseeching their father to endow the 
State rather than themselves, and being ready to 
work for a livelihood rather than to receive an in- 
herited fortune; if I could hear of a few rich men living 
simply and handing out their money for general pur- 
poses, — then I would believe! But none of these 
things is anything but a rare exception; a man who 
gives away his fortune, as Ruskin did, in great hand- 
fuls, is generally thought to be slightly crazy; and, 
speaking frankly, the worth of a man seems to depend 
not upon what he has given to the world, but upon 
what he has gained from the world. You may say 
it is a rough test; — so it is! But when we begin to 
feel that a man is foolish in hoarding and wise in 
lavishing, instead of being foolish in lavishing and 
wise in hoarding, then, and not till then, shall I believe 



202 Father Payne 

that we are a truly great nation. At present the man 
whom we honour most is the man who has been 
generous to public necessities, and has yet retained 
a large fortune for himself. That is the combination 
which we are not ashamed to admire. " 



XXXVIII 

OF LONELINESS 

WE were walking together, Father Payne and I. 
It was in the early summer — a still, hot day. 
The place, as I remember it, was very beautiful. We 
crossed the stream by a little foot-bridge, and took 
a bypath across the meadows; up the slope you 
came to a beautiful bit of old forest country, the 
trees of all ages, some of them very ancient; there 
were open glades running into the heart of the wood- 
land, with thorn thickets and stretches of bracken. 
Hidden away in the depth of the woods, and ap- 
proached only by green rides, were the ruins of what 
must have been a big old Jacobean mansion ; but no- 
thing remained of it except some grassy terraces, a bit 
of a fine facade of stone with empty windows, half- 
hidden in ivy, and some tall stone chimney-stacks. 
The forest lay silent and still; and, along one of the 
branching rides, you could discern far away a glimpse 
of blue hills. The scene was so entirely beautiful 
that we had gradually ceased to talk, and had given 
ourselves up to the sweet and quiet influence of the 
place. 

We stood for awhile upon one of the terraces 

looking at the old house, and Father Payne said, "I'm 

not sure that I approve of the taste for ruins ; there is 

something to be said for a deserted castle, because it 

203 



204 Father Payne 

is a reminder that we do not need to safeguard our- 
selves so much against each others' ill-will; but a 
roofless church or a crumbling house — there's some- 
thing sad about them. It seems to me a little like 
leaving a man unburied in order that we may come 
and sentimentalize over his bones. It means, this 
house, the decay of an old centre of life — there's 
nothing evil or cruel about it, as there is about a 
castle ; and I am not sure that it ought not to be either 
repaired or removed — 

"'And doorways where a bridegroom trode 
Stand open to the peering air.'" 

"I don't know," I said; "I'm sure that this is 
somehow beautiful. Can't one feel that nature is 
half-tender, half -indifferent to our broken designs?" 

"Perhaps," said Father Payne, "but I don't 
like being reminded of death and waste — I don't 
want to think that they can end by being charming — • 
the vanity of human wishes is more sad than pic- 
turesque. I think Dr. Johnson was right when he 
said, 'After all, it is a sad thing that a man should lie 
down and die. '" 

A little while afterwards he said, "How strange it 
is that the loneliness of this place should be so de- 
lightful! I like my fellow-beings on the whole — I 
don't want to avoid them or to abolish them — but 
yet it is one of the greatest luxuries in the world to 
find a place where one is pretty sure of not meeting 
one of them. " 

"Yes, " I said, "it is very odd! I have been feeling 
to-day that I should like time to stand still this summer 
afternoon, and to spend whole days in rambling about 
here. I won't say, " I said with a smile, "that I should 



Of Loneliness 205 

prefer to be quite alone; but I shouldn't mind even 
that in a place like this. I never feel like that in a 
big town — there is always a sense of hostile currents 
there. To be alone in a town is always rather mel- 
ancholy; but here it is just the reverse. " 

"Indeed, yes," said Father Payne, "and it is one 
of the great mysteries of all to me what we really 
want with company. It does not actually take away 
from us our sense of loneliness at all. You can't 
look into my mind, nor can I look into yours ; whatever 
we do or say to break down the veil between us, we 
can't do it. And I have often been happier when alone 
than I have ever been in any company. " 

"Isn't it a sense of security?" I said; "I suppose 
that it is an instinct derived from old savage days 
which makes us dread other human beings. The 
further back you go, the more hatred and mistrust 
you find; and I suppose that the presence of a friend, 
or rather of someone with whom one has a kind of 
understanding, gives a feeling of comparative safety 
against attack." 

"That's it, no doubt," said Father Payne; "but 
if I had to choose between spending the rest of my 
life in solitude, or in spending it without a chance 
of solitude, I should be in a great difficulty. I am 
afraid that I regard company as a wholesome medi- 
cine against the evils of solitude rather than solitude 
as a relief from company. After all, what is it that 
we want with each other? — what do we expect to 
get from each other? I remember," he said, smiling, 
" a witty old lady saying to me once that eternity was a 
nightmare to her. — ' For instance, ' she said, ' I enjoy 
sitting here and talking to you very much; but if I 
thought it was going on to all eternity, I shouldn't 



206 Father Payne 

like it at all. ' Do we really want the company of any 
one for ever and ever? And if so, why? Do we 
want to agree or to disagree? Is the point of it that 
we want similarity or difference? Do we want to hear 
about other people's experiences, or do we simply want 
to tell our own? Is the desire, I mean, for congenial 
company anything more than the pleasure of seeing 
our own thoughts and ideas reflected in the minds of 
others; or is it a real desire to alter our own thoughts 
and ideas by comparing them with the experiences of 
others? Why do we like books, for instance? Isn't 
it more because we recognize our own feelings than 
because we make acquaintance with unfamiliar feel- 
ings? It comes to this: Can we really ever gain an 
idea, or can we only recognize our own ideas?" 

"It is very difficult," I said; "if I answered 
hastily, I should say that I liked being with you be- 
cause you give me many new ideas ; but if I think about 
it, it seems to me that it is only because you make me 
recognize my own thoughts." 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "I think that is so. If 
I see another man behaving well where I should 
behave ill, I recognize that I have all the elements in 
my own mind for doing the same, but that I have given 
undue weight to some of them and not enough weight 
to others. I don't think, on the whole, that anyone 
can give one a new idea; he can only help one to a 
sense of proportion. But I want to get deeper than 
that. You and I are friends — at least I think so; 
but what exactly do we give each other? How do you 
affect my solitude, or I yours? I'm blessed if I know. 
It looks to me, indeed, as if you and I might be parts 
of one great force, one great spirit, and that we recog- 
nize our unity, through some material condition which 



Of Loneliness 207 

keeps us apart. I am not sure that it isn't only the 
body that divides us, and that we are a part of the 
same thing behind it all. " 

"But why, if that is so," said I, "do we feel a 
sense of unity with some people, and not at all with 
others? There are people, I mean, with whom I feel 
that I have simply nothing in common, and that our 
spirits could not possibly mix or blend. With you, 
to speak frankly, it is different. I feel as though I had 
known you far longer than a few months, and should 
never be in any real doubt about you. I recognize 
myself in you and yourself in me. But there are 
many people in whom I don't recognize myself at all. " 

Father Payne put his arm through mine. "Well, 
old man, " he said, "we must be content to have found 
each other, but we mustn't give up trying to find other 
people too. I think that is what civilization means — 
a mutual recognition — we're only just at the start of 
it, you know. I'm in no doubt as to what you give 
me — it's a sense of trust. When I think about you, 
I feel, ' Come, there is someone at all events who will 
try to understand me and to forgive me and to share 
his best with me' — but even so, my boy, I shall enjoy 
being alone sometimes. I shall want to get away 
from everyone, even from you! There are thoughts 
I cannot share with you, because I want you to think 
better of me than I do of myself. I suppose that is 
vanity — but still old Wordsworth was right when he 
wrote : 

"'And many love me; but by none 
Am I enough beloved.'" 



XXXIX 

OF THE WRITER'S LIFE 

I WAS walking once with Father Payne in the fields, 
and he was talking about the difficulties of the 
writer's life. He said that the great problem for all in- 
dustrious writers was how to work in such a way as not 
to be a nuisance to the people they lived with. "Of 
course men vary very much in their habits," he said; 
"but if you look at the lives of authors, they often 
seem tiresome people to get on with. The difficulty is 
mostly this," he went on, "that a writer can't write 
to any purpose for more than about three hours a 
day — if he works really hard, even that is quite enough 
to tire him out. Think what the brain is doing — it is 
concentrated on some idea, some scene, some situation. 
Take a novelist: he has to have a picture in his mind 
all the time — a clear visualization of a place — a room, 
a garden, a wood; then he must know how his people 
move and look and speak, and he has to fly back- 
wards and forwards from one to another; then he has 
the talk to create, and he has to be always rejecting 
thoughts and impressions and words, good enough 
in themselves, but not characteristic. It is a fearful 
strain on imagination and emotion, on phrase-making 
and word-finding. The real wonder is not that a few 
people can do it better than others, but that anyone 
can do it at all. The difference between the worst 
208 



Of the Writer's Life 209 

novelist and the best is much less than the difference 
between the worst novelist and the person who can't 
write at all. 

"Well, then, there is such a thing as inspiration; 
most creative writers get a book in their minds, and 
can think of nothing else, day and night, while it is 
on. The difficulty is to know what a writer is to do 
in the intervals between his books, and in the hours 
in which he is not writing. He has got to take it 
easy somehow, and the question is what is he to do. 
He can't, as a rule, do much in the way of hard exer- 
cise. Violent exercise in the open air is pleasant 
enough, but it leaves the brain torpid and stagnant. 
A man who really makes a business of writing has got 
to live through ten or twelve hours of a day when he 
isn't writing. He can't afford to read very much — at 
least he can't afford to read authors whom he admires, 
because they affect his style. There is something 
horribly contagious about style, because it is often 
much easier to do a thing in someone else's way than 
to do it in one's own. Pater was asked once if he had 
read Stevenson or Kipling, I forget which — 'Oh, no, 
I daren't!' he said, 'I have peeped into him occasion- 
ally, but I can't afford to read him. I have learnt 
exactly how I can approach and develop a subject, 
and if I looked to see how he does it, I should soon lose 
my power. The man with a style is debarred from 
reading fine books unless they are on lines entirely 
apart from his own. ' That is perfectly true, I expect. 
There is nothing so dreadful as reading a writer whom 
one likes, and seeing that he has got deflected from 
his manner by reading some other craftsman. The 
effect is a very subtle one. If you really want to see 
that sort of sympathy at work, you should look at 



210 Father Payne 

Ruskin's letters — his letters are deeply affected by the 
correspondent to whom he is writing. If he wrote to 
Carlyle or to Browning, he wrote like Carlyle and 
Browning, because, as he wrote, they were strongly in 
his mind. 

"With a painter or a musician it is different — a 
lot of hand-work comes in which relieves the brain, 
so that they can work longer hours. But a writer, 
as a rule, while he is writing, can't even afford to talk 
very much to interesting people, because talking is 
hard work too. 

"Well, then, a writer, as an artistic person, is rather 
easily bored. He likes vivid sensations and emphatic 
preferences — and it is not really good for him to be 
bored ; a man may read the paper, write a few letters, 
stroll, garden, chatter — but if he takes his writing 
seriously, he must somehow be fresh for it. It isn't 
easy to combine writing with any other occupation, 
and it leaves many hours unoccupied. 

"Carlyle is a terrible instance, because he was 
wretched and depressed when he was not writing; he 
was melancholy, peevish, physically unwell; and when 
he was writing, he was wholly absorbed, very im- 
patient of his labour, and most intolerable. Indeed, 
it does not look as if the home lives of writers have 
generally been very happy — there is too often a patent 
conspiracy to keep the great irritable babyish giant 
amused — and that's a bad atmosphere for anyone 
to live in — an unreal, a royal sort of atmosphere, of 
deferential scheming." 

I said something about Walter Scott. "Ah, yes," 
said Father Payne, "but Scott's work was amazing — 
it just seemed to overflow from a gigantic reservoir 
of vitality. He could do his day's work in the early 



Of the Writer's Life 211 

hours, and then tramp about all day, chattering, 
farming, planting, entertaining — endlessly good-hu- 
moured. Of course he wore himself out at last by 
perfectly ghastly work — most of it very poor stuff. 
Browning and Thackeray were men of the same sort, 
sociable, genial, exuberant. They overflowed too — 
they didn't batter things out. 

"But, as a rule, most men who want to do good 
work must be content to potter about, and seem lazy 
and even self-indulgent. And one of the reasons why 
many men who start as promising writers come to 
nothing is because they can't be inert, acquiescent, 
easy-going. I have often thought that a good novel 
might be written about the wife of a great writer, who 
marries him, dazzled by his brilliance, and then finds 
him to be a petty, suspicious, wayward sort of child, 
with all his force lying in one supreme faculty of vision 
and expression. It must be a fiery trial to see deep, 
wise, beautiful things produced by a man who can't 
live his thoughts — can only write them. " 

"But what should a man do?" I said. 

"Well," said Father Payne, "I think, as a practical 
matter, it would be a good thing to cultivate a hobby 
of a manual kind — and also, above all, the power of 
genial loafing. Of course, the real pity is that we are 
not all taught to do some housework as a matter of 
course — we depend too much on servants, and house- 
work is the natural and amusing outlet of our physical 
energies; as it is, we specialize too much, and half of 
our maladies and discomforts and miseries are due to 
that — that we work a part of ourselves too hard, and 
the other parts not hard enough. The thing to aim 
at is equanimity, and the existence of unsatisfied in- 
stincts in us is what poisons life for many people." 



212 Father Payne 

He was silent for a little, and then he said, "And 
then, too, there is the great danger of all writers — the 
feeling that he has the power of giving people what 
they want, when he ought to remember that he has 
only the good fortune of expressing what people feel. 
Art oughtn't to be a thing sprinkled on life, as you 
shake sugar out on to a pudding — it is just a power 
of disentangling things; we suffer most of us from 
finding life too complicated — we don't understand it 
— it's a mass of confused impressions. Well, the artist 
puts it all in order, isolates the important things, 
makes the values distinct — he helps people to feel 
clearly — that's his only use. And then, if he suc- 
ceeds, there come silly flatteries and adorations — until 
he gets to feel as if he were handing down pots of jam 
and bottles of wine from a high shelf out of reach — 
until he grows to believe that he put them there, when 
he only found them there. It's a dreadful thing for 
an artist never to succeed at all, because then his life 
appears the most useless business conceivable; but it 
is almost a worse thing to get to depend upon success — 
and it is undeniably pleasant to be a personage, to 
cause a little stir when you enter a room, to find that 
people know all about you and like meeting you, 
and saying they have met you. I never had any of 
that : and I have sometimes found myself with success- 
ful writers who made me thank God I couldn't write — 
such complacency, such lolling among praise, such 
vexation at not being deferred to ! The best fate for a 
man is to be fairly successful, and to be at the same 
time pretty severely criticized. That keeps him 
modest, while it gives him a degree of confidence that 
he is doing something useful. The danger is of drifting 
right out of life into unreal civilities and compliments, 



Of the Writer's Life 213 

which you don't wholly like and yet can't do without. 
The fact is that writing doesn't generally end in 
very much happiness, except perhaps the happiness of 
work. That's the solid part of it really, and no one 
can deprive you of that, whatever happens. " 



XL 

OF WASTE 

WE were discussing Keats and his premature 
death. Someone had said that, besides being 
one of the best, he was also one of the most promising 
of poets; and Father Payne had remarked that reading 
Keats's letters made him feel more directly in the 
presence of a man of genius than any other book he 
knew. Kaye had added that the death of Keats 
seemed to him the most ghastly kind of waste, at 
which Father Payne had smiled, and said that that 
presupposed that he was knocked out by some malign 
or indifferent force. "It is possible — isn't it?" he 
added, "that he was needed elsewhere and summoned 
away." "Then why was he so elaborately tortured 
first?" said Kaye. "Well," said Father Payne, 
"I can conceive that if he had recovered his health, 
and escaped from his engagement with Fanny Brawne, 
he might have been a much finer fellow afterwards. 
There were two weak points in Keats, you know — 
his over-sensuousness and a touch of commonness — 
I won't call it vulgarity, " he added, "but his jokes are 
not of the best quality! I do not feel sure that his 
suffering might not have cleared away the poisonous 
stuff." 

"Perhaps," said Kaye; "but doesn't that make it 
more wasteful still? The world needs beauty — and 
214 



Of Waste 215 

for a man to die so young with his best music in him 
seems to me a clumsy affair. " 

"I don't know," said Father Payne; "it seems to 
me harder to define the word waste than almost any 
word I know. Of course there are cases when it is 
obviously applicable — if a big steamer carrying a 
cargo of wheat goes down in a storm, that is a lot of 
human trouble thrown away — and a war is wasteful, 
because nations lose their best and healthiest parental 
stock. But it isn't a word to play with. In a middle- 
class household it is applied mainly to such things as 
there being enough left of a nice dish for the servants 
to enjoy; and, generally speaking, I think it might be 
applied to all cases in which the toil spent over the 
making of a thing is out of all proportion to the enjoy- 
ment derived from it. But the difficulty underlying 
it is that it assumes a knowledge of what a man's duty 
is in this world — and I am not by any means sure that 
we know. Look at the phrase 'a waste of time.' 
How do we know exactly how much time a man ought 
to allot to sleep, to work, to leisure? I had an old 
puritanical friend who was very fond of telling people 
that they wasted time. He himself spent nearly two 
hours of every day in dressing and undressing. That 
is to say that when he died at the age of seventy-six, 
he had spent about six entire years in making and 
unmaking his toilet ! Let us assume that everyone is 
bound to give a certain amount of time to doing the 
necessary work of the world — enough to support, 
feed, clothe, and house himself, with a margin to 
spare for the people who can't support themselves and 
can't work. Then there are a lot of outlying things 
which must be done — the work of statesmen, lawyers, 
doctors, writers — all the people who organize, keep 



216 Father Payne 

order, cure, or amuse people. Then there are all the 
people who make luxuries and comforts — things not 
exactly necessary, but still reasonable indulgences. 
Now let us suppose that anyone is genuinely and 
sensibly occupied in any one of these ways, and does 
his or her fair share of the world's work: who is to 
say how such workers are to spend their margin of 
time? There are obviously certain people who are 
mere drones in the hive — rich, idle, extravagant people; 
we will admit that they are wasters. But I don't 
admit for a moment that all the time spent in enjoying 
oneself is wasted, and I think that people have a right 
to choose what they do enjoy. I am inclined to be- 
lieve that we are here to live, and that work is only a 
part of our material limitations. A great deal of the 
usefulness of work is not its intrinsic value, but its 
value to ourselves. It isn't only what we perform that 
matters ; it is the fact that work forces us into relations 
with other people, which I take to be the experience 
we all need. In the old dreary books of my childhood, 
the elders were always hounding the young people into 
doing something useful — useful reading, useful sewing, 
and so forth. But I am inclined to believe that so- 
ciability and talk are more useful than reading, and 
that solitary musing and dreaming and looking about 
are useful too. All activity is useful, all interchange, 
all perception. What isn't useful is anything which 
hides life from you, any habit that drugs you into 
inactivity and idleness, anything which makes you 
believe that life is romantic and sentimental and 
fatuous. I wouldn't even go so far as to say that all 
the time spent in squabbling and quarrelling is useless, 
because it brings you up against people who think 
differently from yourself. That becomes wasteful 



Of Waste 217 

the moment it leaves you with the impotent desire 
to hurt your adversary. No, I am inclined to think 
that the only thing which is wasteful is anything which 
suspends interest and animation and the love of life; 
and I don't blame idle and extravagant people who 
live with zest and liveliness for doing that. I only 
blame them for not seeing that their extravagance is 
keeping people at the other end of the scale in drudgery 
and dulness. Of course the difficulty of it is, that if 
we offered the lowest stratum of workers a great 
increase of leisure, they would largely misuse it; and 
that is why I believe that in the future a large part of 
the education of workers will be devoted to teaching 
them how to employ their leisure agreeably and not 
noxiously. And I believe that there are thousands 
of cases in the world which are infinitely worse than 
the case of Keats — who, after all, had more joy of the 
finest quality in his short life than most of us achieve. 
I mean the cases of men and women with fine and 
sensitive instincts, who by being born under base and 
down-trodden conditions are never able to get a taste 
of clean, wholesome, and beautiful life at all — that's 
a much darker problem." 

"But how do you fit that into your theories of life 
at all?" said Vincent. 

"Oh, it fits my theory of life well enough," said 
Father Payne. "You see, I believe it to be a real 
battle, and not a sham fight. I believe in God as 
the source of all the fine, beautiful, and free instincts, 
casting them lavishly into the world, against a horribly 
powerful and relentless but ultimately stupid foe. 
'Who put the evil there?' you may say, 'and how did 
it get there first? ' Ah, I don't know that — that is the 
origin of evil. But I don't believe that God put it 



218 Father Payne 

there first, just for the interest of the fight. I don't 
believe that He is responsible for waste — I think it is 
one of the forces He is fighting. He pushes battalion 
after battalion to the assault, and down they go. 
It's cruel work, but it isn't anything like so cruel as 
to suppose that He arranged it all or even permitted it 
all. That would indeed sicken and dishearten me. 
No, I believe that God never wastes anything; but it's 
a fearful and protracted battle; and I believe that 
He will win in the end. I read a case in the paper the 
other day of a little child in a workhouse that had 
learnt a lot of infamous language, and cursed and swore 
if it was given milk instead of beer or brandy. Am I 
to believe that God was in any way responsible for 
putting a little child in that position? — for allowing 
things to take shape so, if He could have checked it? 
No, indeed! I do not believe in a God as helpless or 
as wicked as that ! There is something devilish there, 
for which He is not responsible, and against which He 
is fighting as hard as He can. " 

"But doesn't heredity come in there? " said Vincent. 
"It isn't the child's fault, and probably no amount of 
decent conditions would turn that child into anything 
respectable." 

"Yes," said Father Payne; "heredity is just one 
of the evil devices — but don't you see the stupidity 
of it? It stops progress, but it also helps it on — it 
hinders, but it also helps; and nothing in the world 
seems to me so Divine as the way in which God is 
using and mastering heredity for good. It multiplies 
evil, but it also multiplies good; and God has turned 
that weapon against the contriver of it. The wiser 
that the world grows, the more they will see how to use 
heredity for happiness, by preventing the tainted from 



Of Waste 219 

continuing to taint the races. The slow civilization 
of the world is the strongest proof I know that the 
battle is going the right way. The forces of evil are 
being slowly transformed into the forces of good. 
The waste of noble things is but the slow arrival of the 
new armies of light. There is something real in fight- 
ing for a General who has a very urgent and terrible 
business on hand. There is nothing real about 
fighting for one who has brought both the armies into 
the field. It doesn't do to sentimentalize about evil, 
and to say that it is hidden good! The world is a 
probation, I don't doubt — but it is testing your 
strength against something which is really there, and 
can do you a lot of harm, not against something which 
is only there for the purpose of testing what might 
have been made and kept both innocent and strong. " 



XLI 

OF EDUCATION 

FATHER PAYNE generally declined to talk about 
education. "Teaching is one of the things, like 
golf and hunting, which is exciting to do and pleasant 
to remember, but intolerable to talk about," he said 
one evening. 

"Well," I said, "it is certainly intolerable to listen 
to people discussing education, or to read about it; 
but if you know anything about it, I should have 
thought it was good fun to talk about it. " 

"Ah," said Father Payne, "you say, 'If you know 
anything about it. ' The worst of it is that everybody 
knows everything about it. A man who is a success 
thinks that his own education is the only one worth 
having ; a man who is a failure thinks that all systems 
of education are wrong. And as for talking about 
teaching, you can't talk about it — you can only relate 
your own experience, and listen with such patience 
as you can muster to another man relating his. That's 
not talking!" ' 

"But it is interesting in a general way," said 
Vincent, — "the kind of thing you are aiming at, what 
you want to produce, and so on." 

"Yes, my dear Vincent," said Father Payne, "but 
education isn't that — it's an obstinate sort of tradi- 
tion; it's a quest, like the Philosopher's Stone. Most 



Of Education 221 

people think that it is a sort of charm which, if you 
could discover it, would transmute all baser metals into 
gold. The justification of the Philosopher's Stone is, 
I suppose, that different metals are not really different 
substances, but only different arrangements of the 
same atoms. But we can't predicate that of human 
spirits as yet; and to attempt to find one formula of 
education is like planting the same crop in different 
soils. It is the ridiculous democratic doctrine of 
human equality which is the real difficulty. There is 
no natural equality in human nature, and the question 
really is whether you are going to try to reduce all 
human beings to the same level, which is the danger of 
discipline, or to let people follow their own instincts 
unchecked, which is the shadow of liberty. I'm all 
for liberty, of course. " 

"But why 'of course'?" said Vincent. 

"Because* I take the aristocratic view," said Father 
Payne, "which is that you do more for the human 
race by having a few fine people, than by having an 
infinite number of second-rate people. What the 
first-rate man thinks to-day, the second-rate people 
think to-morrow — that is how we make progress ; and 
I would like to take infinite pains with the best ma- 
terial, if I could find it, and leave discipline for the 
second-rate. The Jews and the Greeks, both first- 
class nations, have done more for the world on the 
whole than the Romans and the Anglo-Saxons, who 
are the best of the second-rate stocks." 

"But how are you going to begin to sort your 
material?" said Barthrop. 

"Yes, you have me there," said Father Payne. 
"But I don't despair of our ultimately finding that 
out. At present, the worst of men of genius is that 



222 Father Payne 

they are not always the most brisk and efficient boys. 
A genius js apt to be perceptive and sensitive. His 
perceptiveness makes him seem bewildered, because 
he is vaguely interested in everything that he sees; 
his sensitiveness makes him hold his tongue, because 
he gets snubbed if he asks too many questions. Men 
of genius are not as a rule very precocious — they are 
often shy, awkward, absent-minded. Genius is often 
strangely like stupidity in its early stages. The 
stupid boy escapes notice because he is stupid. The 
genius escapes notice because he is diffident, and wants 
to escape notice." 

"But how would you set about discovering which 
was which?" said Barthrop. 

"Well," said Father Payne, "if you ask me, I 
don't think we discriminate; I think we go in for 
teaching children too much, and not trying to make 
them observe and think more. We give them things 
to do, and to get by heart; we imprison them in a 
narrow round of gymnastics. As Dr. Johnson said 
once, 'You teach your children the use of the globes, 
and when they get older you wonder that they do not 
seek your society!' The whole thing is so devilish 
dull, and it saves the teacher such a lot of trouble! 
I myself was fairly quick as a boy, and found that it 
paid to do what I was told. But I never made the 
smallest pretence to be interested in what I had to do 
— grammar, Euclid, tiny scraps of Latin and Greek. 
I used to thank God, in Xenophon lessons, when a bit 
was all about stages and parasangs, because there 
were fewer words to look out. The idea of teaching 
languages like that! If I had a clever boy to teach 
a language, I would read some interesting book with 
him, telling him the meaning of words, until he got a 



Of Education 223 

big stock of ordinary words ; I would just teach him the 
common inflexions; and when he could read an easy 
book, and write the language intelligibly, then I would 
try to teach him a few niceties and idioms, and make 
him look out for differences of style and language. 
But we begin at the wrong end, and store his memory 
with exceptions and idioms and niceties first. No 
sensible human being who wanted, let us say, to know 
enough Italian to read Dante, would dream of setting 
to work as we set to work on classics. Well then," 
Father Payne went on, "I should cultivate the imagi- 
nation of children a great deal more. I should try to 
teach them all I could about the world as it is — the 
different nations, and how they live, the distribution 
of plants and animals, the simpler sorts of science. 
I don't think that it need be very accurate, all that. 
But children ought to realize that the world is a big 
place, with all sorts of interesting and exciting things 
going on. I would try to give them a general view of 
history and the movement of civilization. I don't 
mean a romantic view of it, with the pomps and shows 
and battles in the foreground; but a real view — how 
people lived, and what they were driving at. The 
thing could be done, if it were not for the bugbear 
of inaccuracy. To know a little perfectly isn't enough ; 
of course, people ought to be able to write their own 
language accurately, and to do arithmetic. Outside 
of that, you want a lot of general ideas. It is no good 
teaching everything as if everyone was to end as a 
Professor. " 

"That is a reasonable general scheme," said Bar- 
throp, "but what about special aptitudes?" 

"Why," said Father Payne, "I should go on those 
general lines till boys and girls were about fourteen. 



224 Father Payne 

And I should teach them with a view to the lives they 
were going to live. I should teach girls a good deal of 
housework, and country boys about the country — we 
mustn't forget that the common work of the world has 
to be done. You must somehow interest people in the 
sort of work they are going to do. It is hopeless with- 
out that. And then we must gradually begin to 
specialize. But I'm not going into all that now. The 
general aim I should have in view would be to give 
people some idea of the world they were living in, and 
try to interest them in the part they were going to play; 
and I should try to teach them how to employ their 
leisure. That seems entirely left out at present. I 
want to develop people on simple and contented lines, 
with intelligent interests and, if possible, a special 
taste. The happy man is the man who likes his work, 
and all education is a fraud if it turns out people who 
don't like their work; and then I want people to have 
something to fall back upon which they enjoy. No 
one can live a decent life without having things to 
look forward to. But, of course, the whole thing turns 
on Finance, and that is what makes it so infernally 
dull. You want more teachers and better teachers; 
you want to make teaching a profession which attracts 
the best people. You can't do that without money, 
and at present education is looked upon as an expen- 
sive luxury. That's all part of the stodgy Anglo- 
Saxon mind. It doesn't want ideas — it wants 
positions which carry high salaries ; and really the one 
thing which blocks the way in all our education is that 
we care so much for money and property, and can't 
think of happiness apart from them. As long as our 
real aim in England is income, we shall not make 
progress; because we persist in thinking of ideas as 



Of Education 225 

luxuries in which a man can indulge if he has a suffi- 
cient income to afford to do so." 

"You take a gloomy view of our national ideals, 
Father," said Vincent. 

" Not a gloomy view, my boy, " said Father Payne; 
"only a dull view! We are a respectable nation — we 
adore respectability; and I don't think it is a sympa- 
thetic quality. What I want is more sympathy and 
more imagination. I think they lead to happiness; 
and I don't think the Anglo-Saxon cares enough about 
happiness; if he is happy, he has an uneasy idea that 
he is in for a disaster of some kind. " 



XLII 

OF RELIGION 

I FOUND Father Payne one morning reading a letter 
with knitted brows. Presently he cast it down on 
the table with a gesture of annoyance. "What a 
fool one is to argue!" he said — and then stopping, he 
said, "But you wanted something — what is it?" It 
was a question about some books which was soon 
answered. Then he said: "Stay a few minutes, 
won't you, unless you are pressed? I have got a tire- 
some letter, and if you will let me pour out my com- 
plaint to you, I shall be all right — otherwise I shall go 
about grumbling and muttering all day, and inventing 
repartees." 

I sate down in a chair. "Yes, do tell me!" I said; 
" I have really very little to do this morning, but finish 
up a bit of work." 

He looked at me with a twinkle in his eye. "I 
expect you ought to be at work," he said, "and if I 
were conscientious, I should send you away — but this 
is rather interesting, I think." 

He meditated for a moment, and then went on. 
"It's this! I have got involved in an argument with 
an old friend of mine who is a stiff sort of High-Church- 
man — a parson. It's about religion, too, and it's no 
good arguing about religion. You only confirm your 
adversary in his opinion. He brings forth the bow, 
226 



Of Religion 227 

and makes ready the arrows within the quiver. I 
needn't go into the argument. It's the old story. He 
objected to something I said as 'vague,' and I was 
ass enough to answer him. He is one of those people 
who are very strong on dogma, and treats his religion as 
if it were a sort of trades' union. He thinks I am a 
kind of blackleg, not true to my principles; or rather 
he thinks that I am not a Christian at all, and only 
call myself one for the sake of the associations. Of 
course he triumphs over me at every point. He is 
entrenched in what he calls a logical system, and he 
fires off texts as if from a machine-gun. Of course my 
point is that all strict denominations have got a se- 
verely logical system, but that they can't all be sound, 
because they all deduce different conclusions from the 
same evidence. All denominational positions are 
drawn up by able men, and I imagine that an old 
theology like the Catholic theology is one of the most 
ingenious constructions in the world from the logical 
point of view. But the mischief of it all is that the 
data are incomplete, and many of them are not mathe- 
matically demonstrable at all. They are all coloured 
by human ideas and personalities and temperaments, 
and half of them are intuitions and experiences, which 
vary at different times and under different circum- 
stances. All precise denominational systems are the 
outcome of the desire for a precise certainty in the 
minds of business-like people — the people who say 
that they wish to know exactly where they are. Now 
I don't go so far as to say, or even to think, that re- 
ligion will always be as mysterious a thing as it is 
now. I fully expect that we shall know much more 
about it some day. But we don't at present know 
very much about the central things of all — the nature 



228 Father Payne 

of God, the relation of good and evil, life after death, 
human psychology. We have not reached the point 
of being able definitely to identify the moral force of 
the world with the forces which do not appear to be 
moral, but are undoubtedly active — with realities, 
that is, as we come into contact with them. There 
are no scientific certainties on these points — we simply 
have not reached that stage. My friend's view is that 
out of a certain number of denominations, one is 
undoubtedly right. My view is that all are necessarily 
incomplete. But the moment I say this, he says that 
my religion is so vague as not to be a religion at all. 

"Now my own position is this, that I think religion, 
by which I mean our relation to the Power behind the 
world, is the most important fact in the world, as well 
as the most absorbingly interesting. Whatever form 
of religion I study, I seem to see the same thing going 
on. The saints, however much they differ in dogma, 
seem to me to have a strong family likeness. Mystic- 
ism is a very definite thing indeed, and I have never 
any doubt that all mystics have the same or a very 
similar experience, namely, the perception of some 
perfectly definite force — as real a force as electricity, 
for instance — with which they are in touch. Some- 
thing, which is quite clearly there, is affecting them 
in a particular way. 

"If you ask me what that something is, I don't 
know. I believe it to be a sort of life-force, which 
can and does mingle itself with our own life; and 
I believe that we are all affected by it, just as every 
drop of water on the earth is affected by the moon's 
attraction — though we can measure that effect in 
an ocean by observing the tides, when we can't 
measure it in a basin of water. We are not all equally 



Of Religion 229 

conscious of it, and I don't know why that is. Some- 
times I am aware of it myself, and sometimes not. 
But I have had enough experience of it to feel that 
something is making signals to me, affecting me, at- 
tracting me. And the reason why I am a Christian 
is because in Christianity and in the teaching of 
Christ I feel the influence of it in a way that I feel it 
nowhere else in the same degree. I feel that Christ 
was closer to what I recognize as God; knew God 
better than anyone that ever lived, and in a different 
kind of way — from inside, so to speak. But it's a life 
that I find in the Gospel, and not a creed: and I 
believe that this is religion, to be somehow in touch 
with a higher life and a higher sort of beauty. 

"But I personally don't want this explained and 
defined and codified. That seems to me only to 
hem it in and limit it. The moment I find it reduced 
to dogma and rule, to definite channels of grace, to 
particular powers entrusted to particular persons, then 
I begin to be stifled and, what is worse, bored. I 
don't feel it to be a logical affair at all — I feel it to be 
a living force, the qualities of which are virtue, beauty, 
peace, enthusiasm, happiness; all the things which 
glow and sparkle in life, and make me long to be differ- 
ent — to be stronger, wiser, more patient, more inter- 
ested, more serene. I want to share my secret with 
others, not to keep it to myself. But when I argue 
with my friend, I don't feel it is my secret but his, and 
that in his mind the force itself is missing, while a lot 
of rules and logical propositions and arrangements 
have taken its place. It is just as though I were in 
love with a girl, and were taken to task by someone, 
and informed of a score of conventions which I must 
observe if I wish to be considered really in love. I 



230 Father Payne 

know what love means to me, and I know how I want 
to make love; and the same sort of thing is happening 
to lovers all the world over, though they don't all 
make love in the same way. You can't codify the 
rules of love!" 

Presently he went on: "It seems to me like this — 
like seeing the reflection of the moon. You may see 
it in the marble basin of a fountain, clear and distinct. 
You may see it blurred into ripples on a wind-stirred 
sea. You may see it moulded into liquid curves on a 
swift stream. The changing shapes of it matter little 
— you are sure that it is the same thing which is being 
reflected, however differently it appears. I believe 
that human nature has a power of reflecting God, and 
the different denominations seem to me to reflect Him 
in different ways, like the fountain and the stream and 
the sea. But the same thing is there, though the 
forms seem to vary. And therefore we must not 
quarrel with the different attempts to reflect it — or 
even be vexed if the fountain tells the sea that it is 
not reflecting the moon at all. Take my advice, my 
boy," he added, smiling, "and never argue about re- 
ligion — only try to make your own spirit as calm and 
true as you can!" 



XLIII 



OF CRITICS 



I CAME in from a stroll one day with Father Payne 
1 and Barthrop. Father Payne opened a letter 
which was lying on the hall table, and said, "Hallo, 
Leonard, look at this. Gladwin is coming down for 
Sunday — that will be rather fun!" 

"I don't know about fun," said Barthrop; "at 
least I doubt if I should find it fun, if I had the re- 
sponsibility of entertaining him. " 

"Yes, it's a great responsibility," said Father 
Payne. "I feel that. Gladwin is a man who has 
to be taken as you find him, but who never makes 
any pretence of taking you as he finds you! But 
it will amuse me to put him through his paces a bit!" 

"Who on earth is Gladwin?" said I, consumed 
by curiosity. 

Father Payne and Barthrop laughed. "I should 
like Gladwin to hear that!" said Barthrop. 

"Only it would grieve him still more if Duncan 
had heard of him," said Father Payne; "there would 
be a commonness about that!" Then turning to me, 
he said, " Gladwin? Well, he's about the most critical 
man in England, I suppose. He does a little work — 
a very little: and I think he might have been a great 
man, if he hadn't become so fearfully dry. He began 
by despising everyone else, and ended by despising 
231 



232 Father Payne 

himself — and now it's almost a torture to him to make 
up his mind. 'There's something base about a 
decision,' he once said to me. But 'despising' isn't 
the right word. He doesn't despise — that would be 
coarse. He only feels the coarseness of things in 
general. He has got too fine an edge on his mind — 
— everything blunts it!" 

"Do you remember Rose's song about him?" said 
Barthrop. 

"Yes, what was it?" said Father Payne. 

"The refrain," said Barthrop, "was 

" ' Not too much of whatever is best, 
That is enough for me ! ' " 

Father Payne laughed. "Yes, I remember!" 
he said; " ' Not too much ' is a good stroke! " 

I happened to be with Father Payne when Gladwin 
arrived. He was a small, trim, compact man, about 
forty, unembarrassed and graceful, but with an air 
of dejection. He had a short pointed beard and 
moustache, and his hair was growing grey. He had 
fine thin hands, and he was dressed in old but well- 
fitting clothes. He had an atmosphere of great 
distinction about him. I had expected something 
incisive and clear-cut about him, but he was conspicu- 
ously gentle, and even deprecating in manner. He 
greeted Father Payne smilingly, and shook hands with 
me, with a courteous little bow. We strolled a little in 
the garden. Father Payne did most of the talking, 
but Gladwin's silence was sympathetic and impressive. 
He listened to us tolerantly, as a man might listen to 
the prattle of children. 

"What are you doing just now?" said Father Payne 
after a pause. 



Of Critics 233 

"Oh, nothing worth mentioning," said Gladwin 
softly. "I work more slowly than ever, I believe. 
It can hardly be called work, indeed. In fact, I 
want to consult you about a few little bits — they 
can hardly be called anything so definite as 'pieces' 
— but I am in doubt about their arrangement. The 
placing of independent pieces is such a difficulty 
to me, you know! One must secure some sort of a 
progression!" 

"Ah, I shall enjoy that," said Father Payne. 
"But you won't take my advice, you know — you 
never do!" 

"Oh, don't say that," said Gladwin. "Of course 
one must be ultimately responsible. It can't be 
otherwise. But I always respect your judgment. 
You always help me to the materials, at all events, 
for a decision!" 

Father Payne laughed, and said, "Well, I shall be 
at your service any time!" 

A little while after, Gladwin said he thought he 
would go to his room. "I know your ways here," 
he said to me with a smile; "one mustn't interfere 
with a system. Besides I like it! It is such a luxury 
to obliterate oneself ! ' ' When we met again before din- 
ner, Gladwin walked across to a big picture, an old sea- 
piece, rather effectively painted, which Father Payne 
had found in a garret, and had had restored and framed. 

"What is this?" said Gladwin very gently; "I 
think this is new?" 

Father Payne told him the story of its discovery, 
adding, "I don't suppose it is worth much — but it 
has a certain breeziness about it, I think. " 

Gladwin considered it in silence, and then turned 
away. 



234 Father Payne 

"Do you like it?" said Father Payne — a little 
maliciously, I thought. 

"Like it?" said Gladwin meditatively, "I don't 
know that I can go as far as that! I like it in your 
house. " 

Gladwin said very little at dinner. He ate and 
drank sparingly; and I noticed that he looked at any 
dish that was offered him with a quick scrutinizing 
glance. He tasted his first glass of wine with the same 
air of suspense, and then appeared to be relieved from 
a preoccupation. But he joined little in the talk, and 
exercised rather a sobering effect upon us. Once or 
twice he spoke out. Mention was made of Gissing's 
Papers of Henry Ryecroft, and Father Payne asked him 
if he had read it. "Oh, no, I couldn't read it, of 
course," said Gladwin; "I looked into it, and had to 
put it away. I felt as if I had opened a letter ad- 
dressed to someone else by mistake! " 

At a later period of the evening, a discussion arose 
about the laws of taste. Father Payne had said that 
the one phenomenon in art he could not understand 
was the almost inevitable reaction which seemed to 
take place in the way in which the work of a great 
writer or painter or musician is regarded a few years 
after his vogue declines. "I am not speaking," said 
Father Payne, "of poor, commonplace, merely popular 
work, but of work which was acclaimed as great by the 
best critics of the time, and which will probably return 
to pre-eminence. " He instanced, I remember, Men- 
delssohn and Tennyson. " Of course, " he said, "they 
both wrote a great deal — perhaps too much — and some 
kind of sorting is necessary. I don't mind the Idylls 
of the King, or the Elijah, being relegated to oblivion, 
because they both show signs of having been done 



Of Critics 235 

with one eye on the public. But the progressive 
young man won't hear of Tennyson or Mendelssohn 
being regarded as serious figures in art at all. Yet 
I honestly believe that poems like 'Now Sleeps the 
Crimson Petal, ' or ' Come down, O Maid, ' have a 
high and permanent beauty about them; or, again, 
the overture to the Midsummer Night's Dream. I 
can't believe that it isn't a thing full of loveliness and 
delight. I can't for the life of me see what happens 
to cause such things to be forgotten. Tennyson and 
Mendelssohn seem to me to have been penetrated 
with a sense of beauty, and to have been great crafts- 
men too: and their work at its best not only satisfied 
the most exacting and trained critics, but thrilled all 
the most beauty-loving spirits of the time with in- 
effable content, as of a dream fulfilled beyond the 
reach of hope. And yet all the light seems to die out 
of them as the years go on. The new writers and 
musicians, the new critics, the new audience, are all 
preoccupied with a different presentment of beauty. 
And then, very slowly, the light seems to return to 
the old things — at least to the best of them : but they 
have to suffer an eclipse, during which they are no- 
thing but symbols of all that is hackneyed and com- 
monplace in music and literature. I think things are 
either beautiful or not: I can't believe in a real shifting 
of taste, a merely relative and temporary beauty. 
If it only happened to the second-rate kinds of good- 
ness, it would be intelligible — but it seems to involve 
the best as well. What do you think, Gladwin?" 

Gladwin, who had been dreamily regarding the 
wine in his glass, gave a little start almost of pain, 
as if a thorn had pricked him. He glanced round 
the table, and then said in his gentlest voice, "Well, 



236 Father Payne 

Payne, I don't quite know from what point of view 
you are speaking — from the point of view of serious 
investigation, or of edification, or of mere curiosity? 
I should have to be sure of that. But, speaking 
hurriedly and perhaps intemperately, I should be 
inclined to think that there was a sort of natural 
revolt against a convention, a spontaneous disgust 
at deference being taken for granted. Isn't it like 
what takes place in politics — though, of course, I 
know nothing about politics — the way, I mean, in 
which the electors get simply tired of a political party 
being in power, and give the other side a chance of 
doing better? I mean that the gross and unintelli- 
gent laudation of any artist who arrives at what is 
called assured fame, naturally turns one's mind on to 
the critical consciousness of his imperfections. I don't 
say it's noble or right — in fact, I think it is probably 
ungenerous — but I think it is natural. " 

"Yes, there is a good deal in that," said Father 
Payne, "but ought not the trained critics to withstand 
it?" 

"The trained critic," said Gladwin, "the man who 
sells his opinion of a work of art for money, is, of 
course, the debased outcome of a degrading system. 
If you press me, I should consider that both the ex- 
travagant laudation and the equally extravagant 
reaction are entirely vulgar and horrible. Person- 
ally, I am not easily pleased: but then what does it 
matter whether I am pleased or not?" 

"But you sometimes bring yourself to form, and 
even express, an opinion?" said Father Payne with a 
smile. 

"An opinion — an opinion — " said Gladwin, shaking 
his head, "I don't know that I ever get so far as that. 



Of Critics 237 

One has a kind of feeling, no doubt; but it is so far 
underground, that one hardly knows what its opera- 
tions may be. " 

'"Well said, old mole! Canst work i' the earth so 
fast? A worthy pioneer!'" said Payne, laughing. 

Gladwin gave a quick smile: "A good quotation!" 
he said, "that was very ready! I congratulate you 
on that! But there's more of the mole than the 
pioneer about my work, such as it is!" 

Gladwin drifted about the next day like a tired 
fairy. 

He had a long conference with Father Payne, and 
at dinner he seemed aloof, and hardly spoke at all. 
He vanished the next day with an air of relief. "Well, 
what did you think of our guest?" said Father Payne 
to me, meeting me in the garden before dinner. 

"Well," I said, "he seemed to me an unhappy, 
heavily-burdened man — but he is evidently extra- 
ordinarily able." 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "that's about it. His 
mind is too big for him to carry. He sees everything, 
understands everything, and passes judgment on 
everything. But he hasn't enough vitality. It 
must be an awful curse to have no illusions — to see the 
inferiority of everything so clearly. He's awfully 
lonely, and I must try to see more of him. But it is 
very difficult. I used to amuse him, and he appointed 
me, in a way he has, a sort of State Jester— Royal 
Letters Patent, you know. But then he began to 
detect the commonness of my mind and taste, and, 
one by one, all the avenues of communication became 
closed. If I liked a book which he disliked, and 
praised it to him, he became inflicted with a kind of 



238 Father Payne 

mental nausea: and it's impossible to see much of a 
man, with any real comfort, when you realize that 
you are constantly turning him faint and sick. I had 
a dreary time with him yesterday. He produced some 
critical essays of his own, which he was thinking of 
making into a book. They were awfully dry, like 
figs which have been kept too long — not a drop of 
juice in them. They were hideously acute, I saw 
that. But there wasn't any reason why they should 
have been written. They were mere dissections: 
I suggested that he should call them ' Depreciations, ' 
and he shivered, and I felt a brute. But that didn't 
last long, because he has a way of putting you in your 
place. I felt like something in a nightmare he was 
having. He annexes you, and he disapproves of you 
at the same time. I am awfully sorry for him, but I 
can't help him. The moment I try, I run up against 
his disapproval, and my vulgar spirit revolts. He's 
an aristocrat, through and through. He comes and 
hoists his flag over a place. I felt all yesterday as 
if I were a rather unwelcome guest in his house, you 
know. It's a stifling atmosphere. I can't breathe 
or speak, because I instantly feel myself suspected 
of crudity! The truth is that Gladwin thinks you 
can live upon light, and forgets that you also want 
air." 

"It seems rather a ghastly business, " I said. 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "it's a wretched busi- 
ness! That combination of great sensitiveness and 
great self-righteousness is the most melancholy thing 
I know. You have to get rid of one or the other — and 
yet that is how Gladwin is made. Now, I have plenty 
of opinions of my own, but I don't consider them final 
pr absolute. It ends, of course, in poor Gladwin 



Of Critics 239 

knowing about a hundredth part of what is going on 
in the world, and thinking that it's d — d bad. Of 
course it is, if you neglect the other ninety-nine parts 
altogether!" 



XLIV 

OF WORSHIP 

IT was one of those perfectly fine and radiant days 
of early summer, with a touch of easterly about the 
breeze, which means perhaps a drier air, and always 
seems to bring out the true colours of our country- 
side, as with a touch of ethereal golden-tinged varnish. 
The humid rain-washed days, so common in England, 
are beautiful enough, with their rolling cloud-ranges 
and their soft mistiness: but the clear sparkle of this 
brighter weather, summer without its haze, intensify- 
ing each tone of colour and sharply defining each 
several tint, has a special beauty of form as well as 
of hue. 

I walked with Father Payne far among the fields. 
He was at first in a silent mood, observing and enjoy- 
ing. We passed a field carpeted with buttercups, 
and he said, "That's a beautiful touch, 'the flower- 
enamelled field' — it isn't just washed with colour, it 
is like hammered work of beaten gold, like the letters 
in old missals!" Presently he burst out into talk: 
"I don't want to say anything affected," he began, 
"but a day like this, out in the country, gives me a 
stronger feeling of what I can only describe as worship 
than anything else in the world, because the scene 
holds the beauty of life so firmly up before you. Wor- 
ship means the sense of the unmistakable presence of 
240 



Of Worship 241 

beauty, I am sure — a beauty great and overwhelming, 
which one has had no part in making — 'The sea is 
His, and He made it, and His hands prepared the dry 
land. come, let us worship and fall down, and kneel 
before the Lord our Maker' — it's that exactly — a sense 
of joyful abasement in the presence of something great 
and infinitely beautiful. I do wish that were more 
clearly stated and understood and believed. Religion, 
as we know it in its technical sense, is so faint-hearted 
about it all ! It has limited worship to things beauti- 
ful enough, arches and music and ceremony: and it 
is so afraid of vagueness, so considerate of man's 
feeble grasp and small outlook, that it is afraid of 
recognizing all the channels by which that sense is 
communicated, for fear of weakening a special effect. 
I'll tell you two or three of the experiences I mean. 
You know old Mrs. Chetwynd, who is fading away 
in that little cottage beyond the churchyard. She is 
poor, old, ill. She can hardly be said to have a single 
pleasure, as you and I reckon pleasures. She just lies 
there in that poky room waiting for death, always 
absolutely patient and affectionate and sweet-tem- 
pered, grateful for everything, never saying a hard or 
cross word. Well, I go to see her sometimes — not as 
often as I ought. She shakes hands with that old 
knotted-looking hand of hers which has grown soft 
enough now after its endless labours. She talks a little 
— she is interested in all the news, she doesn't regret 
things, or complain, or think it hard that she can't be 
out and about. After I have been with her for two 
minutes, with her bright old eyes looking at me out of 
such a thicket, so to speak, of wrinkles, — her face 
simply hacked and seamed by life, — I feel myself in 
the presence of something very divine indeed, — a per- 
16 



242 Father Payne 

fectly pure, tender, joyful, human spirit, suffering 
the last extremity of discomfort and infirmity, and 
yet entirely radiant and undimmed. It is then that 
I feel inclined to kneel down before God, and thank 
Him humbly for having made and shown me so utterly 
beautiful a thing as that poor old woman's courage 
and sweetness. I feel as I suppose the devout Catholic 
feels before the reserved Sacrament in the shrine — in 
the presence of a divine mystery; and I rejoice silently 
that God is what He is, and that I see Him for once 
unveiled. 

"And then the sight of a happy and contented child, 
kind and spirited and affectionate, like little Molly 
Akers, never making a fuss, or seeming to want things 
for herself, or cross, or tiresome — that gives me the 
same feeling! Then flowers often give me the same 
feeling, with their cleanness and fresh beauty and 
pure outline and sweet scent — so useless in a way, 
often so unregarded, and yet so content just to be 
what they are, so apart from every stain and evil 
passion. 

' ' And then in the middle of that you see a man like 
Barlow stumbling home tipsy to his frightened wife 
and children, or you read a bad case in the papers, or 
a letter from a man of virtue finding fault with every- 
body and slinging pious Billingsgate about: or I lose 
my own temper about something, and feel I have made 
a hash of my life — and then I wonder what is the foul 
poison that has got into things, and what is the dismal 
ugliness that seems smeared all over life, so that the 
soul seems like a beautiful bird caught in a slime-pit, 
and trying to struggle out, with its pinions fouled and 
dabbled, wondering miserably what it has done to be so 
filthily hampered." 



Of Worship 243 

He stopped for a minute, and I could see that his 
eyes were full of tears. 

" It is no good giving up the game!" he said. "We 
are in the devil of a mess, no doubt : and even if we try 
our best to avoid it, we dip into the slime sometimes! 
But we must hold fast to the beautiful things, and be 
on the lookout for them everywhere. Not shut our 
eyes in a rapture of sentiment, and think that we can : 

'"Walk all day, like the Sultan of old, in a garden of spice!' 

"That won't do, of course! We can't get out of it 
like that! But we must never allow ourselves to 
doubt the beauty and goodness of God, or make any 
mistake about which side He is on. The marvel of 
dear old Mrs. Chetwynd is just that beauty has tri- 
umphed, in spite of everything. With every kind of 
trouble, every temptation to be dispirited and spiteful 
and wretched, that fine spirit has got through — and, 
by George, I envy her the awakening, when that sweet 
old soul slips away from the cage where she is caught, 
and goes straight to the arms of God! " 

He turned away from me as he said this, and I 
could see that he struggled with a sob. Then he 
looked at me with a smile, and put his arm in mine. 
"Old man, " he said, "I oughtn't to behave like this — 
but a day like this, when the world looks as it was 
meant to look, and as, please God, it will look more and 
more, goes to my heart! I seem to see what God 
desires, and what He can't bring about yet, for all His 
pains. And I want to help Him, if I can ! 

'"We too! We ask no pledge of grace, 
No rain of fire, no heaven-hung sign. 
Thy need is written on Thy face — 

Take Thou our help, as we take Thine!' 



244 Father Payne 

"That's what I mean by worship — the desire to 
be used in the service of a Power that longs to make 
things pure and happy, with groanings that cannot 
be uttered. The worst of some kinds of worship is 
that they drug you with a sort of lust for beauty, 
which makes you afraid to go back and pick up your 
spade. We mustn't swoon in happiness or delight, 
but if we say, 'Take me, use me, let me help!' it is 
different, because we want to share whatever is given 
us, to hand it on, not to pile it up. Of course it's 
little enough that we can do: but think of old Mrs. 
Chetwynd again — what has she to give? Yet it is 
more than Solomon in all his beauty had to offer. We 
must be simple, we mustn't be ambitious. Do you 
remember the old statesman who, praising a disinter- 
ested man, said that he was that rare and singular 
type of man who did public work for the sake of the 
public? That's what I want you to do — that is what 
a writer can do. He can remind the world of beauty 
and simplicity and purity. He can be 'a messenger, 
an interpreter, one among a thousand, to show unto 
man his uprightness!' That's what you have got to 
do, old boy! Don't show unto man his nastiness — 
don't show him up ! Keep on reminding him of what 
he really is or can be. " 

He went on after a moment. " I ought not to talk 
like this," he said, "because I have failed all along 
the line. ' I put in my thumb and pull out a plum, ' 
like Jack Horner. I try a little to hand it on, but it is 
awfully nice, you know, that plum! I don't pretend 
it isn't." 

"Why, Father," I said, much moved at his kind 
sincerity, "I don't know any one in the world who eats 
fewer of his plums than you!" 



Of Worship 245 

"Ah, that's a friendly word!" said Father Payne. 
"But you can't count the plum-stones on my plate." 

We did not say much after this. We walked back 
in the summer twilight, and my mind began to stir and 
soar, as indeed it often did when Father Payne showed 
me his heart in all its strength and cleanness. No one 
whom I ever met had his power of lighting a flame of 
pure desire and beautiful hopefulness, in the fire of 
which all that was base and mean seemed to shrivel 
away. 



XLV 

OF A CHANGE OF RELIGION 

1WAS walking one day with Father Payne ; he said 
to me, "I have been reading Newman's Apologia 
over again — I must have read it a dozen times! It 
is surely one of the most beautiful and singular books 
in the whole world? — and I think that the strangest 
sentence in it is this, — 'Who would ever dream of 
making the world his confidant?' Did Newman, do 
you suppose, not realize that he had done that? And 
what is stranger still, did he not know that he had told 
the world, not the trivial things, the little tastes and 
fancies which any one might hear, but the most inti- 
mate and sacred things, which a man would hardly 
dare to say to God upon his knees ? Newman seems 
to me in that book to have torn out his beating and 
palpitating heart, and set it in a crystal phial for all 
the world to gaze upon. And further, did Newman 
really not know that this was what he always desired 
to do and mostly did — to confide in the world, to tell 
his story as a child might tell it to a mother? It is 
clear to me that Newman was a man who did not only 
desire to be loved by a few friends, but wished every- 
body to love him. I will not say that he was never 
happy till he had told his tale, and I will not say that 
artist-like he loved applause: but he did not wish to 
be hidden, and he earnestly desired to be approved. 
246 



Of a Change of Religion 247 

He craved to be allowed to say what he thought — it is 
pathetic to hear him say so often how ' fierce ' he was — 
and yet he hated suspicion and hostility and misunder- 
standing: and though he loved a refined sort of quiet, 
he even more loved, I think, to be the centre of a fuss! 
I feel little doubt in my own mind that, even when he 
was living most retired, he wished people to be curious 
about what he was doing. He was one of those men 
who felt he had a special mission, a prophetical func- 
tion. He was a dramatic creature, a performer, you 
know. He read the lessons like an actor : he preached 
like an actor: he was intensely self-conscious. Nat- 
urally enough! If you feel like a prophet, the one 
sign of failure is that your audience melts away. " 

Father Payne paused a moment, lost in thought. 

"But," I said, "do you mean that Newman cal- 
culcated all his effects ? ' ' 

"Oh, not deliberately," said Father Payne, "but 
he was an artist pure and simple — he was never less 
by himself than when he was alone, as the old Provost 
of Oriel said of him. He lived dramatically by a kind 
of instinct. The unself-conscious man goes his own 
way, and does not bother his head about other people: 
but Newman was not like that. When he was reading 
it was always like the portrait of a student reading. 
That's the artist's way — he is always living in a sort 
of picture-frame. Why, you can see from the Apologia, 
which he wrote in a few weeks, and often, as he once 
said, in tears, how tenderly and eagerly he remembered 
all he had ever done or thought. His descriptions of 
himself are always romantic: he lived in memories, 
like all poets." 

"But that gives one a disagreeable sense of un- 
reality — of pose," I said. 



248 Father Payne 

"Ah, but that's very short-sighted," said Father 
Payne. "Newman's was a beautiful spirit — wonder- 
fully tender-hearted, self -restrained, gentle, sensitive, 
beauty-loving. He loved beauty as much as any 
man who ever lived — beautiful conduct, beautiful 
life — and then his gift of expression! There's a mar- 
vellous thing. It's pure poetry, most of the Apologia: 
look at the way he flashes into metaphor, at his ex- 
quisite pictures of persons, at his irony, his courtesy, 
his humour, his pathos. He and Ruskin knew exactly 
how to confide in the world, how to humiliate them- 
selves gracefully in public, how to laugh at themselves, 
how to be gay — it's all so well-bred, so delicate! 
Depend upon it, that's the way to make the world 
love you — to tell it all about yourself like a charming 
child, without any boasting or bragging. The world 
is awfully stupid! It adores well-bred egotism. We 
are all deeply inquisitive about people; and if you can 
reveal yourself without vanity, and are a lovable 
creature, the world will overwhelm you with love. 
You can't pay the world a greater compliment than 
to open your heart to it. You must not bore it, of 
course, nor must you seem to be demanding its ap- 
plause. You must just seem to be in need of sym- 
pathy and comfort. You must be a little sad, a little 
tired, a little bewildered. I don't say that is easy to 
do, and a man must not set out to do it. But if a 
man has got something childlike and innocent about 
him, and a nai've way with him, the world will take 
him to its heart. The world loves to pity, to com- 
passionate, to sympathize, much more than it loves 
to admire. " 

"But what about the religious side of it all?" I said. 

"Ah," said Father Payne, "I think that is more 



Of a Change of Religion 249 

touching still. The people who change their religion, 
as it is called, — there is something extremely captivat- 
ing about them as a rule. To want to change your 
form of religion simply means that you are unhappy 
and uneasy. You want more beauty, or more assur- 
ance, or more sympathy, or more antiquity. Have 
you never noticed how all converts personify their 
new Church in feminine terms? She becomes a 
Madonna, something at once motherly and young. 
It is the passion with which the child turns away from 
what is male and rough, to the mother, the nurse, the 
elder sister. The convert isn't really in search of dog- 
mas and doctrines: he is in love with a presence, a 
shape, something which can clasp and embrace and 
love him. I don't feel any real doubt of that. The 
man who turns away to some other form of faith 
wants a home. He sees the ugliness, the spite, the 
malice, the contentiousness of his own Church. He 
loathes the hardness and uncharitableness of it; he is 
like a boy at school sick for home. To me Newman's 
logic is like the effort of a man desperately constructing 
a bridge to escape to the other side of the river. The 
land beyond is like a landscape seen from a hill, a 
scene of woods and waters, of fields and hamlets — ■ 
everything seems peaceful and idyllic there. He wants 
the wings of a dove, to flee away and be at rest. It 
is the same feeling which makes people wish to travel. 
When you travel, the new land is a spectacular thing — • 
it is all a picture. It is not that you crave to live in 
a foreign land: you merely want the luxury of seeing 
life without living life. No ordinary person goes to 
live in Italy because he has studied the political con- 
stitution and organization of Italy, and prefers it to 
that of England. So, too, the charm of a religious 



250 Father Payne 

conversion is that it doesn't seem unpatriotic to do it — 
but you get the feel of a new country without having 
to quit your own. And the essence of it is a flight 
from conditions which you dread and dislike. Of 
course Newman does not describe it so — that is all a 
part of his guilelessness — he speaks of the shadow of a 
hand upon the wall: but I don't doubt that his sub- 
conscious mind thrilled with the sense of a possible 
escape that way. His heart was converted long before 
his mind. What he hated in the English Church was 
having to decide for himself — he wanted to lean on 
something, to put himself inside a stronghold: he 
wanted to obey. Some people dislike the way in 
which he made himself obey, — the way he argued 
himself into holding things which were frankly irra- 
tional. But I don't mind that ! It is the pleasure of 
the child in being told what to do instead of having to 
amuse itself." 

He was silent for a little, and then he said: " I see it 
all so clearly, and yet of course it is in a sense incon- 
ceivable to me, because to my mind all the Churches 
have got a burden of belief which they can't carry. 
The Gospel is simple enough, and it is as much as I 
can do to live on those lines. Besides, I don't want 
to obey — I want to obey as little as I can! The ec- 
clesiastical and the theological tradition is all a world 
of shadows to me. I can't be bound by the pious 
fancies of men who knew no science, and very little 
about evidence of any kind. What I want is just a 
simple and beautiful principle of living, such as I feel 
thrills through the words of Christ. The Prodigal 
Son — that's almost enough for me! It is simplifica- 
tion that I want, and independence. Of course I see 
that if that isn't what a man wants, if he requires that 



Of a Change of Religion 251 

something or someone should be infallible, then he 
does require a good deal of argument and information 
and history. But though I don't object to~people who 
want all that, it isn't what I am in search of. I want 
as much strong emotion and as little system as I can 
get. By emotion I don't mean sentiment, but real 
motives for acting or not acting. I want to hear 
someone saying, ' Come up hither, ' and to see some- 
thing in his face which makes me believe he sees some- 
thing that I don't see and that I wish to see. I don't 
feel that with Newman! He is fifty times better 
than myself, but I couldn't do the thing in his way, 
though I love him with all my heart: it's a quiet sort 
of brotherhood that I want, and not too many rules. 
In fact, it is laws I want, and not rules, and to feel the 
laws rather than to know them. I can't help feeling 
that Newman spent too much of his time in the law- 
court, pleading and arguing: and it's stuffy in there! 
But he will remain for ever one of those figures whom 
the world will love, because it can pity him as well as 
admire him. Newman goes to one's head, you know, 
or to one's heart! And I expect that it was exactly 
what he wanted to do all the time!" 



XLVI 

OF AFFECTION 

FATHER PAYNE, on our walks, invariably stopped 
and spoke to animals. I will not say that ani- 
mals were always fond of him, because that is a priv- 
ilege confined to saints, and heroes of romantic legends. 
But they generally responded to his advances. It 
used to amuse me to hear the way he used to talk to 
animals. He would stop to whistle to a caged bird: 
"You like your little prison, don't you, sweet?" he 
would say. Or he would apostrophize a cat, "Well, 
Ma'am, you must find it wearing to carry on your 
expeditions all night, and to live the life of a domestic 
saint all day. " I asked him once why he did not 
keep a dog, when he was so fond of animals. "Oh, 
I couldn't," he said; "it is so dreadful when dogs get 
old and ill, and when they die! It's sentiment, too; 
and I can't afford to multiply emotions — there are 
too many as it is! Besides, there is something rather 
terrible to me about the affection of a dog — it's so 
unreasonable a devotion, and I like more critical 
affections — I prefer to earn affection! I read some- 
where the other day," he went on, "that it might 
easily be argued that the dog was a higher flight of 
nature even than man; that man has gone ahead in 
mind and inventiveness; but that the dog is on the 
whole the better Christian, because he does by instinct 
252 



Of Affection 253 

what man fails to do by intention — he is so sympa- 
thetic, so unresentful, so trustful ! It is really amazing 
if you come to think of it, the dog's power of attach- 
ment to another species. We must seem very mys- 
terious to dogs, and yet they never question our right 
to use them as we will, while nothing shakes their 
love. And then there is something wonderful in the 
way in which the dog, however old he is, always wants 
to play. Most animals part with that after their first 
youth; but a dog plays, partly for the fun of it, and 
partly to make sure that you like his company and are 
happy. And yet it is a little undignified to care for 
people like that, you know! " 

"How ought one to care for people?" I said. 

"Ah, that's a large question," said Father Payne, 
"the duty of loving — it's a contradiction in terms! 
To love people seems the one thing in the world you 
cannot do because you ought to do it ; and yet to love 
your neighbour as yourself can't only mean to behave 
as if you loved him. And then, what does caring 
about people mean? It seems impossible to say. It 
isn't that you want anything which they can give you 
— it isn't that they need anything you can give them; 
it isn't always even that you want to see them. There 
are people for whom I care who rather bore me ; there 
are people who care for me who bore me to extinction ; 
and again there are people whose company I like for 
whom I don't care. It isn't always by any means that 
I admire the people for whom I care. I see their faults, 
I don't want to resemble them. Then, too, there have 
been people for whom I have cared very much, and 
wanted to please, who have not cared in the least for 
me. Some of the best-loved people in the world seem 
to have had very little love to give away! I have 



254 Father Payne 

a sort of feeling that the people who evoke most affec- 
tion are the people who have something of the child 
always in them — something petulant, wilful, self- 
absorbed, claiming sympathy and attention. It is a 
certain innocence and freshness that we love, I think; 
the quality that seems to say, ' Oh, do make me happy ' ; 
and I think that caring for people generally means just 
that you would like to make them happy, or that they 
have it in their power to make you happy. I think 
it is a kind of conspiracy to be happy together, if 
possible. Probably the mistake we make is to think 
it is one definite thing, when a good many things go to 
make it up. I have been interested in a very large 
number of people — in fact, I am generally interested 
in people; but I haven't cared for all of them, while I 
have cared for a good many people in whom I have 
not been at all interested. But it is easier to say what 
the qualities are that repel affection, than what the 
qualities are which attract it. I don't think any faults 
prevent it, if people are sorry for their faults and are 
sorry to have hurt you. It seems to me impossible 
to care for spiteful people, or for the people who turn 
on you in a sudden anger, and don't want to be for- 
given, but are glad to have made you fear them. I 
don't care for people who claim affection as a right, 
or who bargain for sacrifices. The bargaining element 
must be wholly absent from affection. The feeling 
'it is your turn to be nice' is fatal to it. No, I think 
that it is a feeling that you can live at peace with the 
particular person that is the basis of friendship. The 
element of reproach must be wholly absent: I don't 
mean the element of criticism — that can be impersonal 
— but the feeling ' you ought not to behave like this to 



Of Affection 255 

Father Payne relapsed into silence. "But," I 
said, "surely the people who make claims for affection 
are very often most beloved, even when they are 
unjust, inconsiderate, ill-tempered?" 

"By women," said Father Payne, "but not by 
men — and there's another difficulty. Men and wo- 
men mean such utterly different things by affection, 
that they can't even discuss it together. Women 
will do anything for you, if you claim their help, and 
make it clear that you need them; they will love you 
if you do that. A man, on the other hand, will often 
do his very best to help you, if you appeal to him, but 
he won't care for you, as a rule, in consequence. 
Women like emotional surprises, men do not. A man 
wants to get done with excitement, and to enter on an 
easy partnership — women like the excitement more 
than the ease. And then it is all complicated by the 
admixture of the masculine and feminine tempera- 
ments. As a rule, however, women are interested in 
moody temperaments, and men are bored by them. 
Personally, my own pleasure in meeting a real friend, 
or in hearing from a friend, is the pleasure of feeling, 
'Yes, you are there, just the same,' — it's the tran- 
quillity that one values. The possibility of finding 
a man angry or pettish is unpleasant to me. I feel 
'so all this nonsense has to be cleared away again!' 
I don't want to be questioned and scrutinized, with a 
sense that I am on my trial. I don't mind an ironical 
letter, which shows that a friend is fully aware of my 
faults and foibles; but it's an end of all friendship with 
me if I feel a man is bent on improving me, especially 
if it is for his own convenience. I'm sure that the 
fault-finding element is fatal to affection. That may 
sound weak, but I can't be made to feel that I am 



256 Father Payne 

responsible to other people. I don't recognize any 
one's right to censure me. A man may criticize me 
if he likes, but he mustn't impose upon me the duty of 
living up to his ideal. I don't believe that even God 
does that!" 

"I don't understand," I said. 

"Well," said Father Payne, "I don't believe that 
God says, 'This is my law, and you must obey it 
because I choose.' I believe He says, 'This is the 
law, for me as well as for you, and you will not be 
happy till you obey it. ' — Yes, I have got it, I believe — 
the essence of affection is equality. I don't mean that 
you may not recognize superiorities in your friend, and 
he in you; but they must not come into the question 
of affection. Love makes equal, and when there is a 
real sense of equality, love can begin. " 

"But," I said, "the passion of lovers — isn't that 
all based on the worship of something infinitely su- 
perior to oneself?" 

" Yes, " said Father Payne, "but that means a sight 
of something beyond — of the thing which we all love — 
beauty. I don't say that equality is the thing we 
love — it's only the condition of loving. The lover 
can't love, if he feels himself really unworthy of love. 
He must believe that at worst he can be loved, though 
he may be astonished at being loved ; it is in love that 
it is possible to meet; it is love that brings beauty 
within your reach, or down to your level. It is 
beauty that you love in your friend, not his right to 
improve you. He is what you want to be; and the 
comfort of being loved is the comfort of feeling that 
there is some touch of the same beauty in yourself. 
It is so easy to feel dreary, stupid, commonplace — and 
then someone appears, and you see in his glance and 



Of Affection 257 

talk that there is, after all, some touch of the same 
thing in yourself which you love in him, some touch 
of the beauty which you love in God. But the glory 
of beauty is that it is concerned with being beautiful 
and becoming beautiful — not in mocking or despising 
or finding fault or improving. Love is the finding your 
friend beautiful in mind and heart, and the joy of 
being loved is the sense that you are beautiful to him 
— that you are equal in that ! When you once know 
that, little quarrels and frictions do not matter — what 
does matter is the recognizing of some ugly thing 
which the man whom you thought was your friend 
really clings to and worships. Faults do not matter 
if only the friend is aware of them, and ashamed of 
them: it is the self-conscious fault, proud of its power 
to wound, and using affection as the channel along 
which the envenomed stream may flow, which destroys 
affection and trust. " 

"Then it comes to this," I said, "that affection is a 
mutual recognition of beauty and a sense of equality? " 

"It is that, more or less, I believe," said Father 
Payne. "I don't mean that friends need be aware of 
that — you need not philosophize about your friend- 
ships — but if you ask me, as an analyst, what it all 
consists in, I believe that those are the essential ele- 
ments of it — and I believe that it holds good of the 
dog-and-man friendship as well ! " 



XLVII 

OF RESPECT OF PERSONS 

FATHER PAYNE had been out to luncheon one 
day with some neighbours. He had groaned 
over the prospect the day before, and had complained 
that such goings-on unsettled him. 

"Well, Father," said Rose at dinner, "so you have 
got through your ordeal ! Was it very bad ? ' ' 

"Bad!" said Father Payne, "why should it be bad? 
I'm crammed with impressions — I'm a perfect mine of 
them." 

"But you didn't like the prospect of going?" said 
Rose. 

"No," said Father Payne, "I shrank from the 
strain; you phlegmatic, aristocratic people — men-of- 
the-world, biases, highly-born and highly-placed — - 
have no conception of the strain these things are on 
a child of nature. You are used to such things, Rose, 
no doubt — you do not anticipate a luncheon-party 
with a mixture of curiosity and gloom. But it is good 
for me to go to such affairs — it is like a waterbreak in 
a stream — it aerates and agitates the mind. But you 
don't realize the amount of observation I bring to bear 
on such an event — the strange house, the unfamiliar 
food, the new inscrutable people — everything has to be 
observed, dealt with, if possible accounted for, and if 
unaccountable, then inflexibly faced and recollected. 
258. 



Of Respect of Persons 259 

A torrent of impressions has poured in upon me — to 
say nothing of the anxious consideration beforehand 
of topics of conversation, and modes of investigation ! 
To stay in a new house crushes me with fatigue — and 
even a little party like this, which seems, I daresay, 
to some of you, a negligible, even a tedious thing, 
is to me rich in far-flung experience. " 

"Mayn't we have the benefit of some of it?" said 
Rose. 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "you may — you must, 
indeed! I am grateful to you for introducing the 
subject — it is more graceful than if I had simply 
divested myself of my impressions unsolicited." 

"What was it all about?" said Rose. 

"Why," said Father Payne, "the answer to that 
is simple enough — it was to meet an American! I 
know that race! Who but an American would 
have heard of our little experiment here, and not 
only wanted to know — they all do that — but positively 
arranged to know? Yes, he was a hard-featured man 
— a man of wealth, I imagine — from some place, the 
grotesque and extravagant name of which I could not 
even accurately retain, in the State of Minnesota." 

"Did he want to try a similar experiment?" said 
Barthrop. 

"He did not," said Father Payne. "I gathered 
that he had no such intention — but he desired to 
investigate ours. He- was full of compliments, of 
information, even of rhetoric. I have seldom heard 
a simple case stated more emphatically, or with such 
continuous emphasis. My mind simply reeled before 
it. He pursued me as a harpooner might pursue a 
whale. He had the whole thing out of me in no time. 
He interrogated me as a corkscrew interrogates a cork. 



260 Father Payne 

That consumed the whole of luncheon. I made a poor 
show. My experiment, such as it is, stood none of the 
tests he applied to it. It appeared to be lacking in all 
earnestness and zeal. I was painfully conscious of 
my lack of earnestness. 'Well, sir,' he said at the 
conclusion of my examination-in-chief, 'I seem to 
detect that this business of yours is conducted mainly 
with a view to your own entertainment, and I admit 
that it causes me considerable disappointment.' 
The fact is, my boys, " said Father Payne, surveying 
the table, "that we must be more conscious of higher 
aims here, and we must put them on a more commer- 
cial footing!" 

"But that was not all?" said Barthrop. 

"No, it was not all," said Father Payne; "and, 
to tell you the truth, I was more alarmed by than 
interested in the Minnesota merchant. I couldn't 
state my case — I failed in that — and I very much 
doubt if I could have convinced him that there was 
anything in it. Indeed, he said that my conceptions 
of culture were not as clear-cut as he had hoped. " 

"He seems to have been fairly frank, " said Rose. 

"He was frank, but not uncivil," said Father Payne. 
"He did not deride my absence of definiteness, he 
only deplored it. But I really got more out of the 
subsequent talk. We adjourned to a sort of portico, 
a pretty place looking on to a formal garden: it was 
really very charmingly done — : a clever fake of an old 
garden, but with nothing really beautiful about it. 
It looked as if no one had ever lived in it, though the 
illusion of age was skilfully contrived — old paving- 
stones, old bricks, old lead vases, but all looking as if 
they were shy, and had only been just introduced to 
each other. There was no harmony of use about it. 



Of Respect of Persons 261 

But the talk — that was the amazing thing! Such 
pleasant intelligent people, nice smiling women, 
courteous grizzled men. By Jove, there wasn't a 
single writer or artist or musician that they didn't 
seem to know intimately! It was a literary party, I 
gathered : but even so there was a haze of politics and 
society about it — vistas of politicians and personages 
of every kind, all known intimately, all of themquoted, 
everything heard and whispered in the background 
of events — we had no foregrounds, I can tell you, 
nothing second-hand, no concealments or reticences. 
Everyone in the world worth knowing seemed to have 
confided their secrets to that group. It was a privilege 
I can tell you! We simply swam in influences and 
authenticities. I seemed to be in the innermost 
shrine of the world's forces — where they get the steam 
up, you know!" 

"But who are these people, after all?" said Rose. 

"My dear Rose!" said Father Payne. "You 
mustn't destroy my illusions in that majestic manner! 
What would I not have given to be able to ask myself 
that question! To me they were simply the innermost 
circle, to whom the writers and artists of the day told 
their dreams, and from whom they sought encourage- 
ment and sympathy. That was enough for me. I 
stored my memory with anecdotes and noble names, 
like the man in Pride and Prejudice. " 

"But what did it all come to?" said Rose. 

"Well," said Father Payne, "to tell you the truth, 
it didn't amount to very much! At the time I was 
dazzled and stupefied — but subsequent reflection has 
convinced me that the cooking was better than the 
food, so to speak." 

"You mean that it was mostly humbug?" said Rose. 



262 Father Payne 

"Well, I wouldn't go quite as far as that," said 
Father Payne, "but it was not very nutritive — no, 
the nutriment was lacking! Come, I'll tell you 
frankly what I did think as I came away. I thought 
these pretty people very adventurous, very quick, 
very friendly. But I don't truly think they were 
interested in the real thing at all — only interested in 
the words of the wise, and in the unconsidered trifles 
of the Major Prophets, so to speak. I didn't think 
it exactly pretentious — but they obviously only cared 
for people of established reputation. They didn't 
admire the ideas behind, only the reputations of the 
people who said the things. They had undoubtedly 
seen and heard the great people — I confess it amazed 
me to think how easily the men of mark can be ex- 
ploited — but I did not discern that they cared about 
the things represented, — only about the representa- 
tives. The American was different. He, I think, 
cared about the ideas, though he cared about them 
in the wrong way. I mean that he claimed to find 
everything distinct, whereas the big things are natu- 
rally indistinct. They loom up in a shadowy way, and 
the American was examining them through field- 
glasses. But my other friends seemed to me only 
to be interested in the people who had the entree, 
so to speak — the priests of the shrine. They had 
noticed everything that doesn't matter about the high 
and holy ones — how they looked, spoke, dressed, be- 
haved. It was awfully clever, some of it; one of the 
women imitated Legard the essayist down to the 
ground — the way he pontificates, you know — but 
nothing else. They were simply interested in the 
great men, and not interested in what makes the great 
men different from other people, but simply in their 



Of Respect of Persons 263 

resemblance to other people. Even great people have 
to eat, you know! Legard himself eats, though it's a 
leisurely process ; and this woman imitated the way he 
forked up a bit, held it till the bit dropped off, and 
put the empty fork into his mouth. It was excruciat- 
ingly funny — I'll admit that. But they missed the 
point, after all. They didn't care about Legard's 
books a bit — they cared much more about that funny 
cameo ring he wears on his tie! " 

"It all seems to me horribly vulgar," said Kaye. 

"No, it was no more vulgar than a dance of gnats, " 
said Father Payne. "They were all alive, those 
people. They were just gnats, now I come to think of 
it! They had stung all the great men of the day — 
even drawn a little blood — and they were intoxicated 
by it. Mind, I don't say that it is worth doing, that 
kind of thing! But they were having their fun — and 
the only mistake they made was in thinking they 
cared about these people for the right reasons. No, 
the only really rueful part of the business was the 
revelation to me of what the great people can put up 
with, in the way of being feted, and the extent to which 
they seem able to give themselves away to these pretty 
women. It must be enervating, I think, and even 
exhausting, to be so pawed and caressed; but it's 
natural enough, and if it amuses them, I'm not going 
to find fault. My only fear is that Legard and the 
rest think they are really living with these people. 
They are not doing that; they are only being roped 
in for the fun of the performance. These charming 
ladies just ensnare the big people, make them chatter, 
and then get together, as they did to-day, and com- 
pare the locks of hair they have snipped from their 
Samsons. But it isn't a bit malicious — it's simply 



264 Father Payne 

childish; and, by Jove, I enjoyed myself tremend- 
ously. Now, don't pull a long face, Kaye! Of course 
it was very cheap — and I don't say that any one ought 
to enjoy that sort of thing enough to pursue it. But 
if it comes in my way, why, it is like a dish of sweet- 
meats! I don't approve of it, but it was like a story 
out of Boccaccio, full of life and zest, even though the 
pestilence was at work down in the city. We must 
not think ill of life too easily! I don't say that these 
people are living what is called the highest life. But, 
after all, I only saw them amusing themselves. There 
were some children about, nice children, sensibly 
dressed, well-behaved, full of go, and yet properly 
drilled. These women are good wives and good 
mothers ; and I expect they have both spirit and ten- 
derness, when either is wanted. I'm not going to be- 
moan their light-mindedness; at all events, I thought 
it was very pleasant, and they were very good to me. 
They saw I wasn't a first-hander or a thoroughbred, 
and they made it easy for me. No, it was a happy 
time for me — and, by George, how they fed us! I 
expect the women looked after all that. I daresay 
that, as far as economics go, it was all wrong, and 
that these people are only a sort of scum on the surface 
of society. But it is a pretty scum, shot with bright 
colours. Anyhow, it is no good beginning by trying 
to alter them! If you could alter everything else, 
they would fall into line, because they are good- 
humoured and sensible. And as long as people are 
kindly and full of life, I shall not complain; I would 
rather have that than a dreary high-mindedness. " 

Father Payne rose. "Oh, do go on, Father!" 
said someone. " 

"No, my boy," said Father Payne, "I'm boiling 



Of Respect of Persons 265 

over with impressions — rooms, carpets, china, flowers, 
ladies' dresses! But that must all settle down a bit. 
In a few days I'll interrogate my memory, like Words- 
worth, and see if there is anything of permanent worth 
there!" 



XLVIII 

OF AMBIGUITY 

FATHER PAYNE had been listening to some work 
of mine: and he said at the end, "That is grace- 
ful enough, and rather attractive — but it has a great 
fault: it is sometimes ambiguous. Several of your 
sentences can have more than one meaning. I re- 
member once at Oxford," he said, smiling, "that 
Collins, one of our lecturers, had been going through 
a translation-paper with me, and had told me three 
quite distinct ways of rendering a sentence, each 
backed by a great scholar. I asked him, I remember, 
whether that meant that the original writer — it was 
Livy, I think — had been in any doubt as to what his 
words were meant to convey. He laughed, and said, 
'No, I don't imagine that Livy intended to make his 
meaning obscure. I expect, if we took the passage 
to him with the three renderings, he would deride at 
least two of them, and possibly all three, and would 
point out that we simply did not know the usage of 
some word or phrase which would have been absolutely 
clear to a contemporary reader. ' But Collins went 
on to say that there might also be a real ambiguity 
about the passage: and then he quoted the supposed 
remark of the bishop who declined to wear gaiters, 
and said, ' I shall wear no clothes to distinguish myself 
from my fellow-Christians. ' This was printed in his 
266 



Of Ambiguity 267 

biography, 'I shall wear no clothes, to distinguish 
myself from my fellow-Christians.' 'That sentence 
may be fairly called ambiguous,' Collins said, 'when 
its sense so much depends upon punctuation. ' 

"Now," Father Payne went on, "you must re- 
member, in writing, that you write for the eye, you 
don't write for the ear. A book isn't primarily meant 
to be read aloud: and you mustn't resort to tricks of 
emphasis, such as italics and so forth, which can only 
be rendered by voice-inflections. It is your first duty 
to be absolutely clear and limpid. You mustn't 
write long involved sentences which necessitate the 
mind holding in solution a lot of qualifying clauses. 
You must break up your sentences, and even repeat 
yourself rather than be confused. There is no beauty 
of style like perfect clearness, and in all writing mysti- 
fication is a fault. You ought never to make your 
reader turn back to the page before to see what you are 
driving at." 

"But surely," I said, "there are great writers like 
Carlyle and George Meredith, for instance, who have 
been difficult to understand." 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but that's a fault, 
though it may be a magnificent fault. It may mean 
such a pressure of ideas and images that the thing 
can hardly be written at length — and it may give you 
a sense of exuberant greatness. You may have to 
forgive a great writer his exuberance — you may even 
have to forgive him the trouble it costs to penetrate 
his exact thoughts, for the sake of steeping yourself 
in the rush and splendour of the style. But obscurity 
isn't a thing to aim at for any one who is trying to 
write; it may be, in the case of a great writer, a sort of 
vociferousness which intoxicates you: and the man 



268 Father Payne 

may convey a kind of inspiration by his very obscuri- 
ties. But it must be an impulse which simply over- 
powers him — it mustn't be an effect deliberately 
planned. You may perhaps feel the bigness of the 
thought all the more in the presence of a writer who, 
for all his power, can't confine the stream, and comes 
down in a cataract of words. But if you begin trying 
for an effect, it is like splashing about in a pool to make 
people believe it is a rushing river. The movement 
mustn't be your own contortions, but the speed of the 
stream. If you want to see the bad side of obscurity, 
look at Browning. The idea is often a very simple 
one when you get at it; it's only obscure because it is 
conveyed by hints and jerks and nudges. In Pickwick, 
for instance, one does not read Jingle's remarks for 
the underlying thought — only for the pleasure of see- 
ing how he leaps from stepping-stone to stepping- 
stone. You mustn't confuse the pleasure of unravelling 
thought with the pleasure of thought. If you can 
make yourself so attractive to your readers that they 
love your explosions and collisions, and say with a 
half-compassionate delight — ' how characteristic — but 
it is worth while unravelling!' you have achieved a 
certain success. But the chance is that future ages 
won't trouble you much. Disentangling obscurities 
isn't bad fun for contemporaries, who know by instinct 
the nuances of words ; but it becomes simply a bore a 
century later, when people are not interested in old 
nuances, but simply want to know what you thought. 
Only scholars love obscurity — but then they are 
detectives, and not readers." 

"But isn't it possible to be too obvious?" I said — 
"to get a namby-pamby way of writing — what a re- 
viewer calls painfully kind?" 



Of Ambiguity 269 

"Well, of course, the thought must be tough," said 
Father Payne, "but it's your duty to make a tough 
thought digestible, not to make an easy thought tough. 
No, my boy, you may depend upon it that, if you want 
people to attend to you, you must be intelligible. 
Don't, for God's sake, think that Carlyle or Meredith 
or Browning meant to be unintelligible, or even thought 
they were being unintelligible. They were only think- 
ing too concisely or too rapidly for the reader. But 
don't you try to produce that sort of illusion. Try to 
say things like Newman or Ruskin — big, beautiful, 
profound, delicate things, with an almost childlike 
naivete. That is the most exquisite kind of charm, 
when you find that half-a-dozen of the simplest words 
in the language have expressed a thought which holds 
you spellbound with its truth and loveliness. That 
is what lasts. People want to be fed, not to be 
drugged: That, I believe, is the real difference be- 
tween romance and realism, and I am one of those who 
gratefully believe that romance has had its day. We 
want the romance that comes from realism, not the 
romance which comes by neglecting it. But that's 
another subject." 



XLIX 



OF BELIEF 



" T DON'T think there is a single word in the English 
1 language," said Father Payne, " which is respons- 
ible for such unhappiness as the word ' believe. ' It is 
used with a dozen shades of intensity by people; and 
yet it is the one word which is always being used in 
theological argument, and which, like the ungodly, 
'is a sword of thine. ' " 

"I always mean the same thing by it, I believe!" 
I said. 

"Excuse me," said Father Payne, "but if you 
will take observations of your talk, you will find 
you do not. At any rate, / do not, and I am more 
careful about the words I use than many people. If 
I have a heated argument with a man, and think he 
takes up a perverse or eccentric opinion, I am quite 
capable of saying of him, ' I believe he must be crazy. ' 
Now such a sentence to a foreigner would carry the 
evidence of a deep and clear conviction; but, as I say 
it, it doesn't really express the faintest suspicion of 
my opponent's sanity — it means little more than that 
I don't agree with him; and yet when I say, 'If there 
is one thing that I do believe, it is in the actual exist- 
ence of evil, ' it means a slowly accumulated and almost 
unalterable opinion. In the Creed, one uses the word 
'believe' as the nearest that conviction can come to 
270 



Of Belief 271 

knowledge, short of indisputable evidence; and some 
people go further still, and use it as if it meant an 
almost higher sort of knowledge. The real meaning is 
just what Tennyson said, 

"'Believing where we cannot prove,' 

where it signifies a conviction which we cannot 
actually test, but on which we are content to act." 

"But," I said, "if I say to a friend — 'You are a 
real sceptic — you seem to me to believe nothing,' 
I mean to imply something almost cynical." 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "you mean that he 
has no enthusiasm or ideals, and holds nothing 
sacred, because those are just the convictions which 
cannot be proved." 

"Some people," I said, "seem to me simply to mean 
by the word ' believe ' that they hold an opinion in such 
a way that they would be upset if it turned out to be 
untrue." 

"Yes, " said Father Payne, "it is the intrusion of the 
nasty personal element which spoils the word. Be- 
lief ought to be a very impersonal thing. It ought 
simply to mean a convergence of your own experience 
on a certain result ; but most people are quite as much 
annoyed at your disbelieving a thing which they believe 
as at your disbelieving a thing which they know. 
You ought never to be annoyed at people not accepting 
your conclusions, and still less when your conclusion 
is partly intuition, and does not depend upon evi- 
dence. This is the sort of scale I have in my mind 
■ — 'practically certain, probable, possible, unproved, 
unprovable. ' Now, I am so far sceptical that, apart 
from practical certainties, which are just the conver- 
gence of all normal experience, the fact that any one 



272 Father Payne 

person or any number of persons believed a thing would 
not affect my own faith in it, unless I felt sure that 
the people who believed it were fully as sceptical as 
and more clear-headed than myself, and had really 
gone into the evidence. But even so, as I said, the 
things most worth believing are the things that can't 
be proved by any evidence." 

"What sort of things do you mean?" I said. 

"Well, a thing like the existence of God," said 
Father Payne; "that at best is only a generalization 
from an immense range of facts, and a special inter- 
pretation of them. But the amazing thing in the 
world is the vast number of people who are content to 
believe important things on hearsay, because, on the 
whole, they love or trust the people who teach them. 
The word 'believing, ' when I use it, doesn't mean that 
a good man says it, and that I can't disprove it, but 
a sort of vital assent, so that I can act upon the belief 
almost as if I knew it. It means for me some sort of 
personal experience. I could not love or hate a man 
on hearsay, just because people whom I loved or 
trusted said that they either loved or hated him. 
I might be so far biassed that I should meet him ex- 
pecting to find him either lovable or hateful, but I 
could not adopt a personal emotion on hearsay — that 
must be the result of a personal experience; and yet 
the adoption of a personal emotion on hearsay is just 
what most people seem to me to be able to do. I might 
believe that a man had done good or bad things on 
hearsay : but I could have no feeling about him unless 
I had seen him. I could not either love or hate a 
historical personage : the most I could do would be to 
like or dislike all stories told about him so much that 
I could wish to have met him or not to have met him. " 



Of Belief 273 

"Isn't it a question of imagination?" I said. 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "and most ordinary 
religious belief is simply an imaginative personifica- 
tion: but that is a childish affair, not a reasonable 
affair: and that is why most religious teachers praise 
what they call a childlike faith, but what is really a 
childish faith. I don't honestly think that our re- 
ligious beliefs ought to be a dog-like kind of fidelity, 
unresentful, unquestioning, undignified confidence. 
The love of Bill Sikes's terrier for Bill Sikes doesn't 
make Bill Sikes an admirable or lovable man: it only 
proves his terrier a credulous terrier. The only reason 
why we admire such a faith is because it is pleasant 
and convenient to be blindly trusted, and to feel that 
we can behave as badly as we like without alienating 
that sort of trust. I have sometimes thought that 
the deepest anguish of God must lie in His being loved 
and trusted by people to whom He has been unable so 
far to show Himself a loving and careful Father. 
I don't believe God can wish us to love Him in an 
unreasonable way — I mean by simply overlooking 
the bad side of things. A man, let us say, with 
some hideous inherited disease or vice ought not 
to love God, unless he can be sure that God has not 
made him the helpless victim of disease or vice. " 

"But may the victim not have a faith in God 
through and in spite of a disease or a vice?" I said. 

"Yes, if he really faces the fact of the evil," said 
Father Payne; "but he must not believe in a muddled 
sort of way, with a sort of abject timidity, that God 
may have brought about his weakness or his degrada- 
tion. He ought to be quite clear that God wishes him 
to be free and happy and strong, and grieves, like 
himself, over the miserable limitation. He must have 



274 Father Payne 

no sort of doubt that God wishes him to be healthy or 
clean-minded. Then he can pray, he can strive for 
patience, he can fight his fault: he can't do it, if he 
really thinks that God allowed him to be born with this 
horror in his blood. If God could have avoided evil — 
I don't mean the sharp sorrows and trials which have 
a noble thing behind them, but the ailments of body 
or soul that simply debase and degrade — if He could 
have done without evil, but let it creep in, then it 
seems to me a hopeless business, trying to believe in 
God's power or His goodness. I believe in the reality 
of evil, and I believe too in God with all my heart and 
soul. But I stand with God against evil: I don't 
stand facing God, and not knowing on which side He 
is fighting. Everything may not be evil which I think 
evil: but there are some sorts of evil — cruelty, selfish 
lust, spite, hatred — which I believe that God detests 
as much as and far more than I detest them. That is 
what I mean by a belief, a conviction which I cannot 
prove, but on which I can and do act. " 

"But am I justified in not sharing that belief?" I 
said. 

"Yes," said Father Payne; "if you, in the light of 
your experience, think otherwise, you need not believe 
it — you cannot believe it! But it is the only inter- 
pretation of the facts which sets me free to love God, 
which I do not only with heart and soul, but with mind 
and strength. If I could believe that God had ever 
tampered with what I feel to be evil, ever permitted it 
to exist, ever condoned it, I could fear Him — I should 
fear Him with a ghastly fear — but I could not believe 
in Him, or love Him as I do. " 



OF HONOUR 

" ]\|0» I couldn't do that," said Lestrange to Bar- 

1 N throp, in one of those unhappy little silences 
which so often seemed to lie in wait for Lestrange 's 
most platitudinal utterances. "It wouldn't be con- 
sistent with a sense of honour." 

Father Payne gave a chuckle, and Lestrange looked 
pained. "Oughtn't one to have a code of honour?" 
he said. 

"Why, certainly!" said Father Payne, "but you 
mustn't impose your code on other people. You 
mustn't take for granted that your idea of honour 
means the same thing to everyone. Suppose you 
lost money at cards, and called it a debt of honour, 
and thought it dishonourable not to pay it; while 
at the same time you didn't think it dishonourable 
not to pay a poor tradesman whose goods you had 
ordered and consumed — am I bound to accept your 
code of honour?" 

"But there is a difference there," said Rose, "be- 
cause the man to whom you owe a gambling debt 
can't recover it by law, while a tradesman can. All 
that a debt of honour means is that you feel bound 
to pay it, though you are not legally compelled to do 
so." 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "that is so, in a sense, 
275 



276 Father Payne 

I admit. But still, one mustn't shelter oneself be- 
hind big words unless one is certain that they mean 
exactly the same to one's opponent. When I was 
at school there was a master who used to be fond, as 
he said, of putting the boys on their honour: but he 
never asked if we accepted the obligation. If I 
say, ' I give you my honour not to do a thing, ' then 
I can be called dishonourable if I do it ; but you can't 
put me on my honour unless I consent. " 

"But surely honour means something quite de- 
finite?" said Lestrange. 

"Tell me what it is, then," said Father Payne. 
" Rose, you seem to have ideas on the subject. What 
do you mean by honour?" 

"Isn't it one of the ultimate things," said Rose, 
"which can't be defined, but which everyone recog- 
nizes — like blue and green, let me say, or sweet and 
bitter?" 

"No," said Father Payne; "at least I don't think 
so. It seems to me rather an artificial thing, because 
it varies at different dates. It used, not so long ago, 
to be considered an affair of honour to fight a duel 
with a man if he threw a glass of wine in your face. 
And what do you make of the old proverb, 'All is 
fair in love and war'? That seems to mean that 
honour is not a universal obligation. Then there's 
the phrase, 'Honour among thieves,' which isn't a 
very exalted one; or the curious thing, schoolboy 
honour, which dictates that a boy may know that 
another boy is being disgracefully and cruelly bullied, 
and yet is prevented by his sense of honour from telling 
a master about it. I admit that honour is a fine idea ; 
but it seems to me to cover a lot of things in human 
nature which are very bad indeed. It may mean 



Of Honour 277 

only a sort of prudential arrangement which binds a 
set of people together for a bad purpose, because they 
do not choose to be interfered with, and yet call the 
thing honour for the sake of the associations." 

"Yes, I don't think it is necessarily a moral thing, " 
said Rose, "but that doesn't seem to me to matter. 
It is simply an obligation, pledged or implied, that 
you will act in a certain way. It may conflict with a 
moral obligation, and then you have to decide which 
is the greater obligation. " 

"Yes, that is perfectly true," said Father Payne, 
"and as long as you admit that honour isn't in itself 
bound to be a good thing, that is all I want. Le- 
strange seemed to use it as if you had only got to say 
that a motive was honourable, to have it recognized 
by everyone as right. Take the case of what are called 
'national obligations.' A certain party in the State, 
having secured a majority of votes, enters into some 
arrangement — a treaty, let us say — without consulting 
the nation. Is that held to be for ever binding on a 
nation till it is formally repealed? Is it dishonourable 
for a citizen belonging, let us say, to the minority 
which is not represented by the particular Govern- 
ment which makes the treaty, to repudiate it? " 

"Yes, I think it may be fairly called dishonour- 
able," said Rose; "there is an obligation on a citizen 
to back up his Government." 

"Then I should feel that honour is a very com- 
plicated thing," said Father Payne. "If a citizen 
thinks a treaty dishonourable, and if it is also dis- 
honourable for him to repudiate it, it seems to me he 
is dishonourable whatever he does. He is obliged 
to consent for the sake of honour to a dishonourable 
thing being done. It seems to me perilously like a 



278 Father Payne 

director of a firm having to condone fradulent prac- 
tices, because it is dishonourable to give his fellow- 
directors away. It is this conflict between individual 
honour and public honour which puzzles me, and which 
makes me feel that honour isn't a simple thing at all. 
A high conception of private honour seems to me a 
very fine thing indeed. I mean by it a profound 
hatred of anything false or cowardly or perfidious, 
and a loathing of anything insincere or treacherous. 
That sort of proud and stainless chivalry seems to me 
to be about the brightest thing we can discern, and the 
furthest beauty we can recognize. But honour seems 
also, according to you, to be a principle to which you 
can be committed by a majority of votes, whether you 
approve of it or not; and then it seems to me a merely 
detestable thing, if you can be bound by honour to 
acquiesce in something which you honestly believe 
to be base. It seems to me a case of what Tennyson 
describes : 

'"His honour rooted in dishonour stood, 

And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true.'" 

"But surely social obligations must often conflict 
with private beliefs," said Rose. "A nation or a 
society has got to act collectively, and a minority must 
be overridden. " 

"I quite agree, " said Father Payne, "but why mix 
up honour with it at all? I don't object to a man who 
conscientiously dissents to some national move being 
told that he must lump it. But if he is called dis- 
honourable for dissenting, then honour does not seem 
to me to be a real word at all, but only a term of 
abuse for a man who objects to some concerted plan. 
You can't make a dishonest thing honest because a 



Of Honour 279 

majority choose to do it — at least I do not believe that 
morality is purely a matter of majorities, or that the 
dishonour of one century can become the honour of 
the next. I am inclined to believe just the opposite. 
I believe that the man who has so sensitive a con- 
science about what is honourable or not, that he is 
called a Quixotic fool by his contemporaries, is far 
more likely to be right than the coarser majority who 
only see that a certain course is expedient. I should 
believe that he saw some truth of morality clearly 
which the rougher sort of minds did not see. The 
saint — call him what you like — is only the man who 
stands higher up, and sees the sunrise before the people 
who stand lower down." 

"But everyone has a right to his own sense of hon- 
our, " said Rose. 

"Certainly," said Father Payne, "but you must 
be certain that a man's sense of honour is lower than 
your own before you call him dishonourable for differ- 
ing from you. If a man is less scrupulous than myself, 
I may think him dishonourable, if I also think that he 
knows better. But what I do not think that any of 
us has a right to do is to call a man dishonourable if 
he has more scruples than oneself. He may be over- 
scrupulous, but the chances are that any man who 
sacrifices his convenience to a scruple has a higher 
sense of honour than the man who throws over a 
scruple for the sake of his convenience. That is why 
I think honour is a dangerous word to play with, 
because it is so often used to frighten people who don't 
fall in with what is for the convenience of a gang. " 

"But surely," said Rose, "morality is after all only 
a word for what society agrees to consider moral." 

"Yes, in a sense that is so," said Father Payne; 



280 Father Payne 

"it is only a word to express a phenomenon. But 
I believe that morality is a real thing, for all that ; and 
that our conceptions of it get clearer, as the world goes 
on. It is something outside of us — a law of nature if 
you like — which we are learning; not merely a thing 
which we invent for our convenience. But that is too 
big a business to go into now. " 



LI 

OF WORK 

I CANNOT remember now what public man it was 
who had died of a breakdown from overwork, but 
I heard Father Payne say after dinner, referring 
to the event, "I wish it to be clearly understood that 
I think a man who dies of deliberate or reckless over- 
work is a victim of self-indulgence. It is nothing more 
or less than giving way to a passion. I am as sure as 
I can be of anything," he went on, "that a thousand 
years hence that will be recognized by human beings, 
and that they will feel it to be as shameful for a man 
to die of spontaneous overwork as for him to die of 
drink or gluttony or any other vice. I don't of course 
mean," he added, "the cases of men who have had 
some definite and critical job to carry through, and 
have decided that the risk is worth running. A man 
has always the right to risk his life for a definite aim 
— but I mean the men — you can see it in biographies, 
and the worst of it is that they are often the bio- 
graphies of clergymen — who, in spite of physical warn- 
ings, and entreaties from their friends, and definite 
statements by their doctors that they are shortening 
their lives by labour, still cannot stop, or if they stop, 
begin again too soon. No man has any right to think 
his work so important as that — to take unimportant 
things too seriously is the worst sort of frivolity." 
281 



282 Father Payne 

"But isn't it the finer kind of people," said Kaye, 
"who make the mistake?" 

"Yes, of course," said Father Payne, "but so, 
too, if you look into it, you will too often find that 
it is the finer kinds of imaginative people who take 
to drink and drugs. I remember," he added, "once 
going to see a poor friend of mine in an asylum, and the 
old doctor at the head of it said, ' It isn't the stupid 
people who come here, Mr. Payne; it is the clever 
people!'" 

"But does not your principle about the right to risk 
one's life hold good here too?" said Barthrop. 

"No, I think not," said Father Payne. "A man 
may choose to try a dangerous thing, climb a mountain, 
explore a perilous country, go up in a balloon, where 
an element of risk is inseparable from the experiment ; 
but ordinary work isn't risky in itself. Why," he 
added, "I was reading a book the other day, the life 
of Fitzherbert, you know, who was a man of prodigious 
laboriousness, who died early, worn out. He had an 
impossible standard of perfection. If he had to write 
an article, he read all the literature on the subject 
over and over; he wrote and re-wrote his stuff. There 
was a case quoted in the book, as if it were to Fitz- 
herb'ert's credit, when he had to send in an article by 
a certain date — just a Quarterly article. It had to go 
in on the Friday. He had finished it on the Monday 
before, when his mind misgave him. He destroyed 
the article, began again, sat up all Monday night 
and all Wednesday night, and wrote the whole thing 
afresh. He was laid up for a month after it. That is 
simply the act of an unbalanced mind." 

"I can't help feeling that there is something fine 
about it, " said Vincent. 



Of Work 283 

"There is always something fine about unreason- 
able things, " said Father Payne, "or in a man making 
a sacrifice for an idea. But there is an entire lack of 
proportion about this performance; and if Fitzherbert 
thought his work so valuable as that, then he ought 
to have reflected that he was simply limiting his future 
output by this reckless expenditure of force. But the 
whole case was a sad one — Fitzherbert worked in a 
ghastly way as a boy and as a young man. He had a 
very broad outlook, he was interested in everything; 
and when he was at Oxford, he told a friend that he was 
discovering a hundred subjects on which he hoped to 
have a say. Well, then, the middle part of his life 
was spent in preparing himself, under the same sort of 
pressure, to entitle himself to have his say : and then 
came his first bad breakdown — and the end of his 
life, which was a wretched period, was spent in finding 
elaborate reasons why he should not commit himself to 
any opinion whatever. If he was asked his opinion, 
he always said he had not studied the subject ade- 
quately. That seems to me the life of a man suffering 
from a sort of nightmare. Things are not so deep as 
all that — at least, if no one is to give an opinion on any 
point until he has mastered the whole sum of human 
opinion on the point, then we shall never make any 
progress at all. I remember Fitzherbert's strong 
condemnation of Ruskin, for giving his opinion cur- 
sorily on all subjects of importance. Yet Ruskin 
did a greater work than Fitzherbert, because he at 
least made people think while Fitzherbert only pre- 
vented them from daring to think. I don't mean that 
people ought to feel competent to express an opinion 
on everything — yet even that habit cures itself, 
because, if you do it, no one pays any attention. But 



284 Father Payne 

if a man has gone into a subject with decent care, or 
if he has reflected upon problems of which the data 
are fairly well known, I think there is every reason 
why he should give an opinion. It is very easy to be 
too conscientious. There are plenty of fine hints of 
opinions in Fitzherbert's letters. You could make a 
very good book of Pensees out of them — he had a clear, 
forcible, and original mind; but he did not dare to 
say what he thought; and you may remember that if 
he was ever sharply criticized, he felt it deeply, as a 
sort of imputation of dishonesty. A man must not go 
down before criticism like that." 

"But everyone must do his work in his own way?" 
said I. 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but Fitzherbert ended 
by doing nothing — he only snubbed and silenced his 
own fine mind, by giving way to this unholy passion for 
examining things. No, I want you fellows to have 
common-sense about these matters. There is a great 
deal too much sanctity attached to print. The 
written word — there's a dark superstition about it! 
A man has as much right to write as he has to talk. 
He may say to the world, to his unseen and unknown 
friends in it, whatever he may say to his intimates. 
You should write just as you would talk to any gentle- 
man, with the same courtesy and frankness. Of 
course you must run the risk of your book falling into 
the hands of ill-bred people — that can't be helped — 
and of course you must not pretend that your book 
is the result of deep and copious labour, if it is nothing 
of the kind. But heart-breaking toil is not the only 
qualification for speaking. There are plenty of com- 
plicated little topics — all the problems which arise 
from the combination of individuals into societies — 



Of Work 285 

which people ought to think about, and which are 
really everyone's concern. The interplay, I mean, of 
human relations — the moral, religious, social, intel- 
lectual ideas — which have all got to be co-ordinated. 
A man does not need immense knowledge for that ; in 
fact if he studies the history of such things too deeply, 
he is often apt to forget that old interpreters of such 
things had not got all the present data. There is an 
immense future before writers who will interest 
people in and familiarize them with ideas. Some 
people get absorbed in life in the wrong way, just bent 
on acquisition and comfort — some people, again, live 
as if they were staying in somebody else's house — but 
what you want to induce men and women to do is to 
realize the sort of thing that life really is, and to 
attempt to put it in some kind of proportion. The 
mischief done by men like Fitzherbert, who was fond 
of snapping at people who produced ideas for inspec- 
tion, is that ordinary people get to confuse wisdom 
with knowledge; and that won't do! And so the man 
who sets to work like Fitzherbert loses his alertness 
and his observation, with the result that instead of 
bringing a very fresh and incisive mind to bear on life, 
he loses his way in books, and falls a victim to the 
awful passion for feeling able to despise other people's 
opinions." 

"But isn't it possible," said Vincent, "for a man 
to get the best out of life for himself by a sort of passion 
for exact knowledge — like the man in the Grammari- 
an's funeral, I mean?" 

"Personally," said Father Payne, "I always think 
that Browning did a lot of harm by that poem. He 
was glorifying a real vice, I think. If the Grammarian 
had said to himself, ' There is all this nasty work to be 



286 Father Payne 

done by someone; I can do it, and I can save other 
people having to waste their time over it, by doing it 
once and for all, ' it would have been different. But 
I think he was partly indulging a poor sort of vanity 
by just determining to know what no other man knew. 
The point of work is twofold. It is partly good for 
the worker, to tranquillize his life and to reduce it to 
a certain order and discipline; but you mustn't do it 
only for the sake of your own tranquillity, any more 
than the artist must work for the sake of luxuriating 
in his own emotions. You must have something to 
give away: you must have some idea of combination, 
of helping other people to find each other and to 
understand each other. It is vicious to isolate your- 
self for your own satisfaction. Fitzherbert and the 
Grammarian were really misers. They just accumu- 
lated, and enjoyed the pleasure of having their own 
minds clear. That doesn't seem to me in itself to be 
a fine thing at all. It is simply the oldest of tempta- 
tions, 'Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.' 
That is the danger of the critical mind, that it says, 
'I will know within myself what is good.' The only 
excuse for the critical mind is to help people not to be 
taken in by what is bad. It is better to be like Plato 
and Ruskin, to make mistakes, to have prejudices, 
to be unfair, even to be silly, because at least you 
encourage people to think that life is interesting — and 
that is about as much as any of us can do. " 



LII 

OF COMPANIONSHIP 

"TSN'T it rather odd," said someone to Father 

1 Payne after dinner, "that great men have as a 
rule rather preferred the company of their inferiors 
to the company of their equals?" 

"I don't know," said Father Payne; "I think it's 
rather natural! By Jove, I know that a very little 
of the society of a really superior person goes a very 
long way with me. No, I think it is what one would 
expect. When the great man is at work, he is on the 
strain and doing the lofty business for all he is worth ; 
when he is at leisure, he doesn't want any more strain 
— he has done his full share. " 

"But take the big groups," said someone, "like the 
Wordsworth set, or the pre-Raphaelite set — or take 
any of the great biographies — the big men of any time 
seem always to have been mutual friends and cor- 
respondents. You have letters to and from Ruskin 
from and to all the great men of his day. " 

"Letters, yes!" said Father Payne; "of course the 
great men know each other, and respect each other; 
but they don't tend to coagulate. They relish an 
occasional meeting and an occasional letter, and they 
say how deeply they regret not seeing more of each 
other — but they tend to seek the repose of their own 
less exalted circle. The man who has fine ideas pre- 
287 



288 Father Payne 

fers his own disciples to the men who have got a 
different set of fine ideas. That is natural enough! 
You want to impart the ideas you believe in — you 
don't want to argue about them, or to have them 
knocked out of your hand. Depend upon it, the 
society of an intelligent person, who can understand 
you enough to stimulate you, and who is grateful for 
your talk, is much pleasanter, and indeed more fruit- 
ful, than the society of a man who is fully as intelligent 
as yourself, and thinks some of your conclusions to be 
rot!" 

"But doesn't all that encourage people to be pro- 
phets?" Vincent said. "One of the depressing things 
about great men is that they grow to consider them- 
selves a sort of special providence — the originators of 
great ideas rather than the interpreters. " 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "of course the little 
coteries and courts of great men are rather repulsive. 
But the best people don't do that. They live con- 
tentedly in a circle which combines with its admira- 
tion for the hero a comfortable feeling that, if other 
people knew what they know, they wouldn't feel 
genius to be quite so extraordinary as is commonly 
believed. And we must remember, too, that most 
great men seem greater afterwards than they did at 
the time. More of a treat and a privilege, I mean. " 

' ' Do you think one ought to try to catch a sight of 
great men who are contemporaries?" said I. 

"Yes, a sight, I think," said Father Payne. "It's 
a pleasant thing to realize how your big man sits and 
looks and talks, what his house is like, and so forth. 
I have often rather regretted I haven't had the curios- 
ity to get a sight of the giants. It helps you to under- 
stand them. I remember a pleasant old gentleman, 



Of Companionship 289 

Vinter by name, who lived in London. Vinter the 
novelist was his son. When young Vinter became 
famous for a bit, and people wanted to know him, old 
Vinter made a glorious rule. He told his son that he 
might invite any well-known person he liked to the 
house, to luncheon or dinner — but that unless he made 
a special exception in any one's favour, they were not 
to be invited again. There's a fine old Epicurean! 
He liked to realize what the bosses looked like, but 
he wasn't going to be bothered by having to talk 
respectfully to them time after time. " 

"But that's rather tame," said Vincent. "The 
point surely would be to get to know a big man well. " 

"Why, yes," said Father Payne, "but Vinter was 
a wise old man; now I should say to any young man 
who had a chance of really having a friendship with a 
great man, 'Of course, take it and thank your stars!' 
But I shouldn't advise any young man to make a 
collection of celebrities, or to go about hunting them. 
In fact I think for an original young man, it is apt to 
be rather dangerous to have a real friendship with a 
great man. There's a danger of being diverted from 
your own line, and of being drawn into imitative 
worship. A very moderate use of great men in per- 
son should suffice anyone. Your real friends ought to 
be people with whom you are entirely at ease, not 
people whom you reverence and defer to. It's better 
to learn to bark than to wag your tail. I don't think 
the big men themselves often begin by being disciples." 

' ' Then who is worth seeing ? ' ' said Vincent . ' ' There 
must be somebody!" 

"Why, to be frank, " said Father Payne, "agreeable 
men like me, who haven't got too much authority, 
and are not surrounded by glory and worship! I'm 



290 Father Payne 

interested in most things, and have learnt more or less 
how to talk — you look out for ingenious and kindly- 
elderly men, who haven't been too successful, and 
haven't frozen into Tories, and yet have had some 
experience; — men of humour and liveliness, who have 
a rather more extended horizon than yourself, and who 
will listen to what you say instead of shutting you 
up, and saying, 'Very likely,' as Newman did — after 
which you were expected to go into a corner and think 
over your sins! Or clever, sympathetic, interesting 
women — not too young. Those are the people whom 
it is worth taking a little trouble to see. " 

"But what about the young people!" said Vincent. 

"Oh, that will look after itself, " said Father Payne. 
"There's no difficulty about that! You asked me 
whom it was worth while taking some trouble to see, 
and I prescribe a very occasional great man, and a good 
many well-bred, cultivated, experienced, civil men 
and women. It isn't very easy to find, that sort of 
society, for a young man; but it is worth trying for. " 

"But do you mean that you should pursue good 
talk?" said Vincent. 

"A little, I think," said Father Payne; "there's a 
good deal of art in it — unconscious art in England, 
probably — but much of our life is spent in talking, 
and there's no reason why we shouldn't learn how to 
get the best and the most out of talk — how to start a 
subject, and when to drop it — how to say the sort 
of things which make other people want to join in, 
and so on. Of course you can't learn to talk unless 
you have a lot to say, but you can learn how to do it, 
and better still how not to do it. I used to feel in the 
old days, when I met a clever man — it was rare enough, 
alas ! — how much more I could have got out of him if 



Of Companionship 291 

I had known how to do the trick. It's a great pleasure, 
good talk ; and the fact that it is so tiring shows what 
a real pleasure it must be. But a man with whom you 
can only talk hard isn't a companion — he's an adver- 
sary in a game. There have been times in my life 
when I have had a real tough talker staying here with 
me, when I have suffered from crushing intellectual 
fatigue, and felt inclined to say, like Elijah, 'Take 
away my life, for I am not better than my fathers.' 
That is the strange thing to me about most human 
beings — the extent to which they seem able to talk 
without being tired. I agree with Walter Scott, when 
he said, ' If the question was eternal company without 
the power of retiring within myself, or solitary con- 
finement for life, I should say, "Turnkey, lock the 
cell!"' Companionship doesn't seem to me the 
normal thing. Solitude is the normal thing, with a 
few bits of talk thrown in, like meals, for refreshment. 
But you can't lay down rules for people about it. 
Some people are simply gregarious, and twitter to- 
gether like starlings in a shrubbery: that isn't talk — 
it's only a series of signals and exclamations. The 
danger of solitude is that the machinery runs just as 
you wish it to run — and that wears it out. " 

"But isn't your whole idea of talk rather strenuous 
— a little artificial?" said Vincent. 

"Not more so than fixed meals," said Father 
Payne, "or regular exercise. But, of course silent 
companionship is the greatest boon of all. I have a 
belief that even in silent companionship there is a 
real intermingling of vital and mental currents, and 
that one is much pervaded and affected by the people 
one lives with, even if one does not talk to them. 
The very sight of some people is as bad as an argument ! 



292 Father Payne 

The ideal thing, of course, is to have a few intimate 
friends and some comfortable acquaintances. But 
I am rather a fatalist about friendship, and I think 
that most of us get about as much as we deserve. 
Anyhow, it's all worth taking some trouble about; 
and most people make the mistake of not taking any 
trouble or putting themselves about; and that's not 
the way to behave!" 



LIII 

OF MONEY 

I SUPPOSE I had said something high-minded, 
showing a supposed contempt of money, for Father 
Payne looked at me in silence. 

"You mustn't say such things," said he, at last. 
"I'll tell you why! What you said was perfectly 
genuine, and I have no doubt you feel it — but, if 
I may say so, it's like talking about a place where you 
have never been, as if you had visited it, when you 
have only read about it in the guide-book. I don't 
mean that you wish to deceive for an instant — but 
you simply don't know ! That's the tragic thing about 
money — that it is both so important and so unimpor- 
tant. If you have enough money, you need never give 
it a thought; if you haven't, it's the devil! It's like 
health — no one who hasn't been on the wrong side of 
the dividing line knows what a horrible place the wrong 
side is. Those two things — I daresay there are others 
— poverty and ill-health — put a man on the rack. 
The healthy man, and the man with a sufficient in- 
come, are apt to think that the poor man and the ill 
man make a great fuss about very little. I don't 
know about ill-health, but by George, I know all 
about poverty — and I'll tell you once for all. For 
twenty years I was poor, and this is what that means. 
To be tied hand and foot to a piece of hideous drudg- 
293 



294 Father Payne 

ery — morning by morning, month by month, and 
with the consciousness too that, if health fails you, 
or if you lose your work, you will either starve or have 
to sponge on your friends — never to be able to do what 
you like or go where you like — to know that the world 
is full of beautiful places, delightful people, interesting 
ideas, books, talk, art, music — to sicken for all these 
things, and not even to have the time or energy to get 
hold of such scraps of them as can be found cheap in 
London — to feel time slipping away, and all your 
instincts for beautiful things unused and unsated — to 
live a solitary, grubby, nasty life — never able to enter- 
tain a friend, or to go a trip with a friend, or to do a 
kindness, or to help anyone generously — and yet to 
feel that with an income which many people would 
regard as ridiculously inadequate, you could do most 
of these things — the slavery, the bondage, the dreari- 
ness of it ! " He broke off, much moved. 

"But," said I, "don't many quite poor people 
live happily and contentedly and kindly with minute 
incomes?" 

"Why, yes," said Father Payne, "of course they 
do! — and I'm willing enough to admit that I ought to 
have done better than I did. But then I had been 
brought up differently, and by the time I had done 
with Oxford, I had all the tastes and instincts of the 
well-to-do man. That was the mischief, that I had 
tasted freedom. Of course, if I had been cast in a 
stronger and nobler mould, it would have been dif- 
ferent — but all my senses had been acutely developed, 
my faculties of interest and enjoyment and apprecia- 
tion — not gross things, mind you, nor feelings that 
ought to be starved, but just the wholesome delights 
of the well-educated man. I did not want to be 



Of Money 295 

extravagant, and I knew too that there were millions 
of people in the same case as myself. There was every 
reason why I should behave decently about it! If 
I had been really interested in my work, I could have 
done better — but I did not believe in the value of my 
work — I taught men, not to educate them, but that 
they might pass an examination and never look at the 
beastly stuff again. Whenever I reached the point 
at which I became interested, I had to hold my hand. 
And then, too, the work tired me without exercising 
my mind. There were the vacations, of course — but 
I couldn't afford to leave London — I simply lived in 
hell. I don't say that I didn't get some discipline out 
of it — and my escape gave me a stock of gratitude and 
delight that has been simply inexhaustible. The 
misery of it for me was that I had to live an unreal life. 
If I had been poor, and had had my leisure, and had 
worked at things I cared about, with a set, let us 
say, of young artists, all working too at things which 
they cared about, it would have been different — but 
I hadn't the energy left to make friends, or the time to 
find any congenial people. I can't describe what a 
nightmare it all was — so that when I hear you speaking 
as if money didn't really matter, I simply feel that you 
don't know what a tragedy it can be, or what your 
own income saves you from. You and I have the Epi- 
curean temperament, my boy; it's no good pretending 
we haven't — things appeal to our mind and senses in 
a way they don't appeal to everyone. So I don't 
think that people ought to talk lightly about money, 
unless they have known poverty and not suffered 
under it. I used to ask myself in those days if it was 
possible to suffer more, when every avenue reaching 
away out of my life to the things I loved and cared 



296 Father Payne 

for seemed to be closed to me by an impassable 
barrier. " 

"But one can practise oneself in doing without 
things?" I said. 

"With about as much success, " said Father r'ayne, 
"as you can practise doing without food. " 

"But isn't it partly that people are unduly reticent 
about money?" I said. "If people could only say 
frankly what they can and what they can't afford, it 
would simplify things very much." 

"I don't know," said Father Payne. "Money 
is one of those curious things — uninteresting if you 
have enough, tragic if you haven't. I don't think 
talking about money is vulgar — I think it is simply 
dull: to discuss poverty is like discussing a disease — ■ 
to discuss wealth is like talking about food or wine. 
The poverty that simply humiliates and pinches can't 
be joked about — it's far too serious for that! Of 
course, there are men who don't really feel the call of 
life. Look at our friend Kaye! If Kaye had to live 
in London lodgings, he wouldn't mind a bit, if he 
could get to the Museum Reading-Room — he only 
wants books and his own work — he doesn't want 
company or music or art or talk or friends. He is 
wholly indifferent to nasty food or squalor. Poverty 
is not a real evil to him. If he had money he wouldn't 
know how to spend it. I read a book the other day 
about a priest who lived a very devoted life in the 
slums — he had two rooms in a clergy-house — and 
there was a chapter in praise of the way in which he 
endured his poverty. But it was all wrong! What 
that man really enjoyed was preaching and ceremonial 
and company — he had a real love of human beings. 
Well, that man's life was crammed with joy — he got 



Of Money 297 

exactly what he wanted all day long. It wasn't a 
self-sacrificing life — it would have been to you and me 
— but he no doubt woke day after day with a prospect 
of having his whole time taken up with things he 
thoroughly enjoyed." 

"But what about the people," I said, "who really 
enjoy just the sense of power which money gives them, 
without using it — or the people whose only purpose in 
using it is the pleasure of being known to have it? " 

"Oh, of course, they are simply barbarians," said 
Father Payne, "and it doesn't do them any harm to be 
poor. No, the tragedy lies in the case of a man with 
really expansive, generous, civilized instincts, to 
whom the world is full of wholesome and urgent 
delights, and whose life is simply starved out of him 
by poverty. I have a great mind to send you to 
London for a couple of months, to live on a pound a 
week, and see what you make of it. " 

"I'll go if you wish it, " I said. 

"It might bring things home to you," said Father 
Payne, smiling, "but again it probably would not, 
because it would only be a game — the real pinch 
would not come. Most people would rather enjoy 
migrating to hell from heaven for a month — it would 
just give them a sharper relish for heaven. " 

"But do you really think your poverty hurt you?" 
I said. 

" I have no doubt it did, " said Father Payne. "Of 
course I was rescued in time, before the bitterness 
really sank down into my soul. But I think it pre- 
vented my ever being more than a looker-on. I be- 
lieve I could have done some work worth doing, if I 
could have tried a few experiments. I don't know! 
Perhaps I am ungrateful after all. My poverty 



298 Father Payne 

certainly gave me a wish to help things along, and I 
doubt if I should have learnt that otherwise. And I 
think, too, it taught me not to waste compassion on the 
wrong things. The people to be pitied are simply the 
people whose minds and souls are pinched and starved 
■ — the over-sensitive, responsive people, who feel 
hunted and punished without knowing why. It's 
temperament always, and not circumstance, which is 
the happy or the unhappy thing. I felt, when you 
said what you did about poverty, that you neither 
knew how harmless it could be, or how infinitely 
noxious it might be. I don't take a high-minded view 
of money myself. I don't tell people to despise it. 
I always tell the fellows here to realize what they can 
endure and what they can't. The first requisite for 
a sensible man is to find work which he enjoys, and 
the next requisite is for him to earn as much as he 
really needs — that is to say without having to think 
daily and hourly about money. I don't overestimate 
what money can do, but it is foolish to underestimate 
what the want of it can do. I have seen more fine 
natures go to pieces under the stress of poverty than 
under any other stress that I know. Money is per- 
fectly powerless as a shield against many troubles 
— and on the other hand it can save a man from in- 
numberable little wretchednesses and horrors which 
destroy the beauty and dignity of life. I don't be- 
lieve mechanically in humiliation and renunciation 
and ignominy and contempt, as purifying influences. 
It all depends upon whether they are gallantly and 
adventurously and humorously borne. They often 
make some people only sore and diffident, and I don't 
believe in learning to hate life. Not to learn your own 
limitations is childish: and one of the insolences 



Of Money 299 

which is most heavily punished is that of making 
a sacrifice without knowing if you can endure the 
consequences of it. The people who begin by despis- 
ing money as vulgar are generally the people who end 
by making a mess which other people have to sweep 
up. So don't be either silly or prudent about money, 
my boy! Just realize that your first duty is not to be 
a burden on yourself or on other people. Find out 
your minimum, and secure it if you can; and then 
don't give the matter another thought. If it is any 
comfort to you, reflect that the best authors and artists 
have almost invariably been good men of business, 
and don't court squalor of any kind unless you really 
enjoy it." 



LIV 

OF PEACEABLENESS 

FATHER PAYNE, talking one evening, made a 
statement which involved an assumption that 
the world was progressing. Rose attacked him on 
this point. "Isn't that just one of the large generali- 
zations, " he said, "which you are always telling us to 
beware of?" 

"It isn't an assumption," said Father Payne, 
"but a conviction of mine, based upon a good deal 
of second-hand evidence. I don't think it can be 
doubted. I can't array all my reasons now, or we 
should sit here all night — but I will tell you one main 
reason, and that is the immensely increased peaceable- 
ness of the world. Fighting has gone out in schools, 
and none but decayed clubmen dare to deplore it: 
corporal punishment has diminished, and isn't needed, 
because children don't do savage things; bullying is 
extinct in decent schools; crimes of violence are much 
more rare; duelling is no longer a part of social life, 
except for an occasional farcical performance between 
literary men or politicians in France— I saw an account 
of one in the papers the other day. It was raining, and 
one of the combatants would not furl his umbrella: 
his seconds said that it made him a bigger target. 
"I may be shot," he said, "but that is no reason why 
I should get wet!" Then there is the mediaeval 
300 



Of Peaceableness 301 

nonsense among students in Germany, where they 
fence like Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Generally 
speaking, however, the belief that a blow is an argu- 
ment has gone out. Then war has become more rare, 
and is more reluctantly engaged in. I suppose that 
till the date of Waterloo there was hardly a year in 
history when some fighting was not going on. No, I 
think it is impossible not to believe that the impulse to 
kick and scratch and bite is really on the decline. " 

"But need that be a proof of progress?" said Rose. 
" May it not only mean a decrease of personal courage, 
and a greater sensitiveness to pain?" 

"I think not," said Father Payne, "because when 
there is fighting to be done, it is done just as cour- 
ageously — indeed I think more courageously than used 
to be the case. No, I think it is the training of an in- 
stinct — the instinct of self-restraint. I believe that 
people have more imagination and more sympathy 
than they used to have; there is more tolerance of 
adverse opinion, a greater sense of liberty in the air: 
opponents have more respect for each other, and do not 
attribute bad motives so easily. Why, consider how 
much milder even the newspapers are. If one reads 
old reviews, old books of political controversy, old 
pamphlets — how much more blackguarding and calling 
names one sees. Anonymous journalists, anony- 
mous reviewers, are now the only people who keep up 
the tradition of public bad manners — all signed articles 
and criticisms are infinitely politer than they used to 
be." 

"But," persisted Rose, "isn't that simply a possible 
proof of the general declension of force?" 

" Certainly not, " said Father Payne, "it only means 
more equilibrium. You must remember that equi- 



302 Father Payne 

librium means a balance of forces, not a mere diminu- 
tion of them. There is more force present in a banked 
up reservoir than in a rushing stream. The rushing 
stream merely means a force making itself felt without 
a counterbalancing force — but that isn't nearly as 
strong as the pressure in a reservoir exerted by the 
water which is trying to get out, and the resistance of 
the dam which is trying to keep it in. You must not 
be taken in by apparent placidity: it often means two 
forces at work instead of one. Peace, as opposed to 
war, is a tremendous counterpoising of forces, and it 
simply means an organized resistance. In old days, 
there was no cohesion of the forces which desire peace, 
and violence was unresisted. There can be no doubt, 
I think, that in a civilized country there are many 
more forces at work than in a combative country. I 
do not suppose that we can either of us prove whether 
the forces at work in the world have increased or 
diminished. Let us grant that the amount is con- 
stant. If so, a great deal of the force that was com- 
bative has now been transformed to the force which 
resists combat. But I imagine that on the whole 
most people would grant that human energies have 
increased : if that is so, certainly the combative element 
has not increased in proportion, while the peaceful 
element has increased out of all proportion." 

"But," said Vincent, "you often talk in the most 
bellicose way, Father. You say that we ought all to 
be fighting on the side of good. " 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "on the side of resistance 
to evil, I admit; but you can fight without bang- 
ing and smashing things, as the dam fights the reser- 
voir by silent cohesion. There is a temptation, from 
which some people suffer, to think that one can't be 



Of Peaceableness 303 

fighting for God at all, unless one is doing it furiously, 
and all the time, and successfully, and on a large and 
impressive scale. That is a fatal blunder. To hide 
your adversary's sword is often a very good way of 
fighting. To have an open tussle often makes the 
bystanders sympathize with the assailant. It is 
really a far more civilized thing, and often stands for 
a higher degree of force and honour, to be able to bear 
contradiction not ignobly. Direct conflict is a mistake 
as a rule — blaming, fault-finding, censuring, snapping, 
punishing. The point is to put all your energy into 
your own life and work, and make it outweigh the 
energy of the combative critic. Do not fight by de- 
stroying faulty opinion, but by creating better opinion. 
You fight darkness by lighting a candle, not by waving 
a fan to clear it away. Look at one of the things we 
have been talking about — bullying in schools. That 
has not been conquered by expelling or whipping boys, 
or preaching about it — it has been abolished by kind- 
lier and gentler family life, by humaner schoolmasters 
living with and among their boys, till the happiness of 
more peaceful relations all round has been instinctively 
perceived. " 

"But isn't it right to show up mean and dishonest 
people, to turn the light of publicity upon cruel and 
detestable things?" said Vincent. 

"Exactly, my dear Vincent," said Father Payne; 
"but you can't turn the light of publicity on evil unless 
the light is there to turn. The reason why bullying 
continued was because people believed in it as insep- 
arable from school life, and even, on the whole, brac- 
ing. What has got rid of it is a kinder and more tender 
spirit outside. I don't object to showing up bad 
things at all. By all means put them, if you can, in 



304 Father Payne 

a clear light, and show their ugliness. Show vour 
shame and disgust if you like, but do not condescend 
to personal abuse. That only weakens your case, 
because it merely proves that you have still some of the 
bully left in you. Be peaceable writers, my dear 
boys, " said Father Payne, expanding in a large smile. 
"Don't squabble, don't try to scathe, don't be 
affronted ! If your critic reveals a weak place in your 
work, admit it, and do better! I want to turn you 
out peacemakers, and that needs as much energy and 
restraint as any other sort of fighting. Don't make 
the fact that your opponent may be a cad into a per- 
sonal grievance. Make your own idea clear, stick to 
it, repeat it, say it again in a more attractive way. 
Don't you see that not yielding to a bad impulse is 
fighting? The positive assertion of good, the shaping 
of beauty, the presentment of a fruitful thought in so 
desirable a light that other people go down with fresh 
courage into the dreariness and dulness of life, with all 
the delight of having a new way of behaving in their 
minds and hearts — that's how I want you to fight! 
It requires the toughest sort of courage, I can tell you. 
But instead of showing your spirit by returning a blow, 
show your spirit by propounding your idea in a finer 
shape. Don't be taken in by the silly and ugly old 
war-metaphors — the trumpet blown, the gathering of 
the hosts. That's simply a sensational waste of your 
time! Look out of your window, and then sit down 
to your work. That's the way to win, without noise 
or fuss." 



LV 

OF LIFE-FORCE 

I WALKED " in the pastures one afternoon with 
Father Payne, just as winter turned to spring. 
There was a mound at the corner of one of his fields, 
on which grew a row of beech trees of which Father 
Payne was particularly fond. He pointed out to me 
to-day how the most southerly of the trees, exposed as 
it was to the full force of the wind, grew lower and 
sturdier than the rest, and how as the trees progressed 
towards the north, each one profiting more by the 
shelter of his comrades, they grew taller and more 
graceful. "I like the way that stout little fellow at 
the end grows," said Father Payne. "He doesn't 
know, I suppose, that he is protecting the rest, and 
giving them room to expand. But he holds on: and 
though he isn't so tall, he is bulkier and denser than 
his brethren. He knows that he has to bear the brunt 
of the wind, so he puts out no sail. He just devotes 
himself to standing four-square — he is not going to be 
bullied ! He would like to be as smooth and as shapely 
as the rest, but he knows his own business, and he has 
adapted himself, like a sensible fellow, to his rough 
conditions." 

A little later Father Payne stopped to look at a 
great sow-thistle that was growing vigorously under 
a hedgerow. "Did you ever see such a bit of pure 
20 305 



306 Father Payne 

force?" said Father Payne. "I see a fierce conscious 
life in every inch of that plant. Look at the way he 
clips himself in, and strains to the earth: look at his 
great rays of leaves, thrust out so geometrically from 
the centre, with the sharp, horny, uncompromising 
thorns. And see how he flattens down his leaves over 
the surrounding grasses: they haven't a chance; he 
just squeezes them down and strangles them. There 
is no mild and delicate waving of fronds in the air. 
He means to sit down firmly on the top of his comrades. 
I don't think I ever saw anything with such a muscular 
pull on — you can't lift his leaves up; look, he resists 
with all his might! Just consider the immense force 
which he is using : he is not merely snuggling down : he 
is just hauling things about. You don't mean to tell 
me that this thistle isn't conscious! He knows he has 
enemies, but he is going to make the place his very own 
— and all that out of a drifting little arrow of down!" 

"Now that may not be a sympathetic or even 
Christian way of doing things, " he went on presently, 
"but for all that, I do love to see the force of life, the 
intentness of living. I like our friend the beech a 
little better, because he is helping his friends, though 
he doesn't know it, and the thistle is only helping 
himself. But I am sure that it is the right way to go 
at it! We mustn't be always standing aside and 
making room: we mustn't obliterate ourselves. We 
have a right to our joy in life, and we mustn't be 
afraid of it. If we give away what we have got, it 
must cost us something — it must not be a mere 
relinquishing." 

"It is rather hard to combine the two principles," 
I said — "the living of life, I mean, and the giving away 
of life." 



Of Life-Force 307 

"Well, I think that devotion is better than self- 
sacrifice," said Father Payne. "On the whole I 
mistrust weakness more than I mistrust strength. 
It's easy to dislike violence — but I rather worship 
vitality. I would almost rather see a man forcing 
his way through with some callousness, than backing 
out, smiling and apologizing. You can convert 
strength, you can't do anything with weakness. Take 
the sort of work you fellows do. I always feel I can 
chasten and direct exuberance: what I can't do is to 
impart vigour. If a man says his essay is short be- 
cause he can't think of anything to write, I feel 
inclined to say, 'Then for goodness' sake hold your 
tongue ! ' It's the people who can't hold their tongue, 
who go on roughly pointing things out, and comment- 
ing, and explaining, and thrusting themselves in front 
of the show, who do something. Of course force has 
to be kept in order, but there it is — it lives, it must 
have its say. What you have to learn is to insinuate 
yourself into life, like ivy, but without spoiling other 
people's pleasure. That's liberty! The old thistle 
has no respect for liberty, and that is why he is rooted 
up. But it's rather sad work doing it, because he 
does so very much want to be alive. But it isn't 
liberty simply to efface yourself, because you may 
interfere with other people. The thing is to fit in, 
without disorganizing everything about you." 

He mused for a little in silence: then he said, 
"It's like almost everything else — it's a weighing of 
claims! I don't want you fellows to be either tyran- 
nical or slavish. It's tyrannical to bully, it's slavish 
to defer. The thing is to have a firm opinion, not to 
be ashamed of it or afraid of it ; to say it reasonably and 
gently, and to stick to it amiably. Good does not 



308 Father Payne 

attack, though if it is attacked it can slay. Good 
fights evil, but it knows what it is fighting, while evil 
fights good and evil alike. I think that is true. I 
don't want you people to be controversial or quarrel- 
some in what you write, and to go in for picking holes 
in others' work. If you want to help a man to do 
better, criticize him privately — don't slap him in 
public, to show how hard you can lay on. Make 
your own points, explain if you like, but don't apolo- 
gize. The great writers, mind you, are the people 
who can go on. It's volume rather than delicacy that 
matters in the end. It must flow like honey — good 
solid stuff — not drip like rain, out of mere weakness. 
But the thing is to flow, and largeness of production 
is better than little bits of overhandled work. Mind 
that, my boy! It's force that tells: and that's why I 
don't want you to be overinterested in your work. 
You must go on filling up with experience: but it 
doesn't matter where or how you get it, as long as 
it is eagerly done. Be on the side of life! Amor 
fati, that's the motto for a man — to love his destiny 
passionately, and all that is before him: not to droop, 
or sentimentalize, or submit, but to plunge on, like a 
'sea-shouldering whale'! You remember old Kit 
Smart — 

" ' Strong against tide, the enormous whale 
Emerges as he goes.' 

Mind you emerge! Never heed the tide: there's 
plenty of room for it as well as for you! " 



LVI 

OF CONSCIENCE 

L ESTRANGE was being genially bantered by Rose 
one day at dinner on what Rose called "problems 
of life and being," or "springs of action," or even 
"higher ground." Lestrange was oppressively earn- 
est, but he was always good-natured. 

"Ultimately?" he had said, "why, ultimately, of 
course, you must obey your conscience." 

"No, no!" said Father Payne, "that won't do, 
Lestrange! Who are you, after all? I mean that the 
'you' you speak of has something to say about it, to 
decide whether to disobey or to obey. And then, too, 
the same ' you ' seems to have decided that conscience 
is to be obeyed. The thing that you describe as 
'yourself is much more ultimate than conscience, 
because if it is not convinced that conscience is 
to be obeyed, it will not obey. I mean that there 
is something which criticizes even the conscience. 
It can't be reason, because your conscience over- 
rides your reason, and it can't be instinct, gener- 
ally speaking, because conscience often overrides 
instinct." 

"I am confused," said Lestrange. "I mean by 

conscience the thing which says 'You ought!' That is 

what seems to me to prove the existence of God, that 

there is a sense of a moral law which one does not 

309 



310 Father Payne 

invent, and which is sometimes very inconveniently 
aggressive. " 

"Yes, that is all right," said Father Payne, "but 
how is it when there are two ' oughts, ' as there often 
are? A man ought to work — and he ought not to 
overwork — something else has to be called in to decide 
where one ' ought ' begins and the other ends. There is 
a perpetual balancing of moral claims. Your con- 
science tells you to do two things which are mutually 
exclusive — both are right in the abstract. What are 
you to do then?" 

"I suppose that reason comes in there," said 
Lestrange. 

"Then reason is the ultimate guide?" said Father 
Payne. 

"Oh, Father you are darkening counsel," said 
Lestrange. 

"No, no," said Father Payne, "I am just trying 
to face facts." 

"Well, then, " said Lestrange, "what is the ultimate 
thing?" 

"The ultimate thing," said Father Payne, "is of 
course the thing you call yourself — but the ultimate 
instinct is probably a sense of proportion — a sense of 
beauty, if you like!" 

"But how does that work out in practice?" said 
Vincent. "It seems to me to be a mere argument 
about names and titles. You are using conscience 
as the sense of right and wrong, and, as you say, they 
often seem to have conflicting claims. Lestrange 
used it in the further sense of the thing which ulti- 
mately decides your course. It is right to be phi- 
lanthropic, it is right to be artistic — they may conflict ; 
but something ultimately tells you what you can do, 



Of Conscience 311 

which is really more important than what you ought 
to do." 

"That is right," said Father Payne. "I think the 
test is simply this — that whenever you feel yourself 
paralyzed, and your natural growth arrested by your 
obedience to any one claim — instinct, reason, con- 
science, whatever it is — the ultimate power cuts the 
knot, and tells you unfailingly where your real life 
lies. That is the real failure, when owing to some 
habit, some dread, some shrinking, you do not follow 
your real life. That, it seems to me, is where the old 
unflinching doctrines of sin and repentance have done 
harm. The old self-mortifying saints, who thought so 
badly of human nature, and who tore themselves to 
pieces, resisting wholesome impulses — celibate saints 
who ought to have been married, morbidly introspec- 
tive saints who needed hard secular work — those were 
the people who did not dare to trust the sense of pro- 
portion, and were suspicious of the call of life. Look 
at St. Augustine in the wonderful passage about light 
'sliding by me in unnumbered guises' — he can only 
end by praying to be delivered from the temptation 
to enjoy the sight of dawn and sunset, as setting his 
affections too much upon the things of earth. I mis- 
trust the fear of life — I mistrust all fear — at least I 
think it will take care of itself, and must not be culti- 
vated. I think the call of God is the call of joy — and 
I believe that the superstitious dread of joy is one of 
the most potent agencies of the devil. " 

"But there are many joys which one has to mis- 
trust," said Lestrange; "mere sensual delights, for 
instance." 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but most healthy and 
normal people, after a very little meddling with such 



3i2 Father Payne 

delights, learn certainly enough that they only obscure 
the real, wholesome, temperate joys. You have to 
compromise wisely with your instincts, I think. You 
mustn't spend too much time in frontal attacks upon 
them. You have a quick temper, let us say. Well, 
it is better to lose it occasionally and apologize, than 
to hold your tongue about matters in which you are 
interested for fear of losing it. You are avaricious — 
well, hoard your money, and then yield on occasions 
to a generous impulse. That's a better way to defeat 
evil, than by dribbling money away in giving little 
presents which no one wants. I don't believe in 
petty warfare against faults. You know the proverb 
that if you knock too long at a closed door, the devil 
opens it to you? Just give your sins a knock-down 
blow every now and then. I believe in the fire of life 
more than I believe in the cold water you use to quench 
it. Everything can be forgiven to passion; nothing 
can be forgiven to chilly calculation. The beautiful 
impulse is the thing that one must not disobey; and 
when I see people do big, wrong-headed, unguarded, 
unwise things, get into rows, sacrifice a reputation or 
a career without counting the cost, I am inclined to 
feel that they have probably done better for them- 
selves than if they had been prudent and cautious. 
I don't say that they are always right, because people 
yield sometimes to a mere whim, and sometimes to a 
childishly overwhelming desire; but if there is a real 
touch of unselfishness about a sacrifice — that's the 
test, that someone else's joy should be involved — then 
I feel that it isn't my business to approve or disap- 
prove. I feel in the presence of a force — an 'ought' 
as Lestrange says, which makes me shy of intervening. 
It's the wind of the Spirit — it blows where it will — and 



Of Conscience 313 

I know this, that I'm thankful beyond everything 
when I feel it in my own sails. " 

"Tell me when you feel it next, Father," said 
Vincent. 

"I feel it now, " said Father Payne, "now and here. " 
And there was something in his face which made us 
disinclined to ask him any further questions. 



LVII 

OF RANK 

SOMEONE had been telling a curious story about 
a contested peerage. It was a sensational affair, 
involving the alteration of registers, the burning 
down of a vestry, and the flight of a clergyman. 

"I like that story, " said Father Payne, "and I like 
heraldry and rank and all that. It's decidedly pic- 
turesque. I enjoy the zigzagging of a title through 
generations. But the worst of it is that the most 
picturesque of all distinctions, like being the twentieth 
baron, let us say, in direct descent, is really of the 
nature of a stigma; a man whose twentieth ancestor 
was a baron has no excuse for not being a duke. " 

"But what I don't like," said Rose, "is the awful 
sense of sanctity which some people have about it. 
I read a book the other day where the hero sacrificed 
everything in turn, a career, a fortune, an engagement 
to a charming girl, a reputation, and last of all an 
undoubted claim to an ancient barony. I don't 
remember exactly why he did all these things — it was 
noble, undoubtedly it was noble ! But there was some- 
thing which made me vaguely uncomfortable about 
the order in which he spun his various advantages." 

"It's only a sense of beauty slightly awry," said 
Father Payne; "names are curiously sacred things — 
they often seem to be part of the innermost essence of 
3H 



Of Rank 315 

a man. I confess I would rather change most things 
than change my name. I would rather shave my head 
for instance. " 

"But my hero would have had to change his name 
if he had claimed the peerage, " said Rose. 

"Yes, but you see the title was his right name, " said 
Father Payne; "he was only masquerading as a com- 
moner, you must remember. Why I should value an 
ancient peerage is because I think it might improve my 
manners." 

"Impossible!" said Vincent. 

"Thank you," said Father Payne. "Yes, my 
manners are very good for a commoner — but I should 
like to be a little more in the grand style. I should like 
to be able to look long at a person who said something 
of which I disapproved, and then change the subject. 
That would be fine ! But I daren't do that now. Now 
I have to argue. Do you remember in Daniel Deronda 
Grandcourt's habit of looking stonily at smiling per- 
sons? I have often envied that! Whereas my chief 
function in life is looking smilingly at stony persons, 
and that's very bourgeois. " 

"We must show more animation," said Barthrop 
to his neighbour. 

"I mean it!" said Father Payne, "but come, I 
won't be personal! Seriously, you know, the one 
thing I have admired in the very few great people I 
have ever met is the absence of embarrassment. They 
don't need to explain who they are, they haven't got 
to preface their statements of opinion by fragments of 
autobiography, to show their right to speak. It is 
convenient to feel that if people don't know who you 
are, they will feel slightly foolish afterwards when they 
discover, like the man who shook hands warmly with 



316 Father Payne 

Queen Victoria, and said, 'I know the face quite well, 
but I can't put a name to it.' It did not show any 
pride of birth in the Queen to be extremely amused 
by the incident. But even more than that I admire 
the ease which people of that sort get by having had, 
from childhood onwards, to meet all sorts of persons, 
and to behave themselves, and to see that people do 
not feel shy or uncomfortable. I sometimes go about 
the village simply teeming with benevolence, and I 
pass someone, and can't think of anything to say. 
If I had the great manner, I should say, "Why, 
Tommy, is that you?" or some such human signal, 
which would not mean anything in particular, but 
would after all express exactly what is in my mind. 
But I can't just do that. I rack my brains for an 
appropriate remark, because I am bourgeois, and have 
not the point of honour, as the French say. And 
by the time I have elaborated it, Tommy is gone, 
and Jack is passing, and I begin elaborating again; 
whereas I should simply add, if I were aristocratic, 
'And that's you, Jack, isn't it?' That's the way to 
talk." 

We all laughed; and Barthrop said, "Well, I must 
say, Father, that I have often envied you your power 
of saying something to everyone. " 

"I have spent more trouble on it than it is worth, " 
said Father Payne; "and that's my point, that if I 
were only a great man, I should have learnt it all in 
childhood, and should not have to waste time over it 
at all. That's the best of rank; it's a device for sav- 
ing trouble ; it saves introduction and explanation and 
autobiography and elaborate civility, and makes 
people willing to be pleased by the smallest sign of 
affability. You may depend upon it that it was a very 



Of Rank 317 

true instinct which made the Scotch minister pray- 
that all might have honourable ancestors. It isn't 
a sacred thing, rank, and it isn't a magnificent thing — 
but it's a pleasant human sort of thing in the right 
hands. What is more, in these democratic days, it 
tends to make people of rank additionally anxious not 
to parade the fact — and I doubt if there is anything on 
the whole happier than having advantages which you 
don't want to parade — it gives a tranquil sort of con- 
tentment, and it removes all futile ambitions. To be, 
by descent, what a desperately industrious lawyer 
or a successful general feels himself amply rewarded 
for his toil by becoming, isn't nothing. I'm always 
rather suspicious of the people who try to pretend that 
it is nothing at all. The rank is but the guinea stamp, 
of course. But after all the stamp is what makes it a 
guinea instead of an unnegotiable disk of metal!" 



LVIII 

OF BIOGRAPHY 

FATHER PAYNE used often to say that he was 
more interested in biography than in any other 
form of art, and believed that there was a greater fu- 
ture before it than before any other sort of literature. 
"Just think," I remember his saying, "human por- 
traiture — the most interesting thing in the world by 
far — what the novel tries to do and can't do ! " 

"What exactly do you mean by 'can't do'?" I 
said. 

"Why, my boy," said Father Payne, "because we 
are all so horrified at the idea of telling the truth or 
looking the truth in the face. The novel accommo- 
dates human nature, patches it up, varnishes it, puts 
it in a good light : it may be artistic and romantic and 
poetical — but it hasn't got the beauty of truth. Life 
is much more interesting than any imaginative fricas- 
see of it! These realistic fellows — they are moving 
towards biography, but they haven't got much beyond 
the backgrounds yet." 

"But why shouldn't it be done?" I said. "There's 
Boswell's Johnson — why does that stand almost 
alone?" 

"Why, think of all the difficulties, my boy," said 
Father Payne. "There's nothing like Boswell's 
Johnson, of course — but what a subject! There's 
" 3i8 



Of Biography 319 

nothing that so proves Boswell's genius — we mustn't 
forget that — as the other wretched stuff written about 
Johnson. There's a passage in Boswell, when he 
didn't see Johnson for a long time, and stuck in a few 
stories collected from other friends. They are awfully- 
flat and flabby — they have all been rolled about in 
someone's mind, till they are as smooth as pebbles — 
some bits of the crudest rudeness, not worked up to 
— some knock-down schoolboy retorts which most 
civilized men would have had the decency to repress — 
and then we get back to the real Boswell again, and 
how fresh and lively it is!" 

"But what are the difficulties you spoke of?" I 
said. 

"Why, in the first place," said Father Payne, "a 
biography ought to be written during a man's life 
and not after it — and very few people will take the 
trouble to write things down day after day about 
anyone else, as Boswell did. If it waits till after a 
man's death, a hush falls on the scene — everyone is 
pious and sentimental. Of course, Boswell's life is 
inartistic enough — it wanders along, here a letter, 
there a lot of criticism, here a talk, there a reminiscence. 
It isn't arranged — it has no scheme: but how full of 
zest it is ! And then you have to be pretty shameless 
in pursuing your hero, and elbowing other people 
away, and drawing him out: and you have to be pre- 
pared to be kicked and trampled upon, when the hero 
is cross: and then you have to be a considerable snob, 
and say what you really value and admire, however 
vulgar it is. And then you must expect to be called 
hard names when the book appears. I was reading a 
review the other day of what seemed to me to be a 
harmless biography enough — a little frank and enthusi- 



320 Father Payne 

astic affair, I gathered : and the reviewer wrote in the 
style of Pecksniff, caddish and priggish at the same 
time: he called the man to task for botanizing on his 
friend's grave — that unfortunate verse of Words- 
worth's, you know — and he left the impression that the 
writer had done something indelicate and impious, 
and all with a consciousness of how high-minded he 
himself was. 

"You ought to write a biography as though you 
were telling your tale in a friendly and gentle ear — 
you ought not to lose your sense of humour, or be 
afraid of showing your subject in a trivial or ridiculous 
light. Look at Boswell again — I don't suppose a more 
deadly case could be made out against any man, with 
perfect truth, than could be made out against Johnson. 
You could show him as brutal, rough, greedy, super- 
stititious, prejudiced, unjust, and back it all up by 
indisputable evidence — but it's the balance, the net 
result, that matters! We have all of us faults; we 
know them, our friends know them — why the devil 
should not everyone know them? But then an inter- 
esting man dies, and everyone becomes loyal and senti- 
mental. Not a word must be said which could pain 
or wound anyone. The friends and relations, it 
would seem, are not pained by the dead man's faults, 
they are only pained that other people should know 
them. The biography becomes a mixture of disin- 
fectants and perfumes, as if it were all meant to hide 
some putrid thing. It's like what Jowett said about 
a testimonial, ' There's a strong smell here of something 
left out!' We have hardly ever had anything but 
romantic biographies hitherto, and they all smell of 
something left out. There's a tribe somewhere in 
Africa who will commit murder if anyone tries to 



Of Biography 321 

sketch them. They think it brings bad luck to be 
sketched, a sort of ' overlooking ' as they say. Well that 
seems to be the sort of superstition that many people 
have about biographies, as if the departed spirit 
would be vexed by anything which isn't a compliment. 
I suppose it is partly this — that many people are ill- 
bred, glum, and suspicious, and can't bear the idea 
of their faults being recorded. They hate all frank- 
ness: and so when anything frank gets written, they 
talk about violating sacred confidences, and about 
shameless exposures. It is really that we are all 
horribly uncivilized, and can't bear to give ourselves 
away, or to be given away. Of course we don't want 
biographies of merely selfish, stupid, brutal, ill-bred 
men — but everyone ought to be thankful when a life 
can be told frankly, and when there's enough that is 
good and beautiful to make it worth telling. 

"But, as I said, the thing can't be done, unless it 
is written to a great extent in a man's lifetime. Con- 
versation is a very difficult thing to remember — it 
can't be remembered afterwards — it needs notes at 
the time: and few people's talk is worth recording: 
and even if it is, people are a little ashamed of doing it 
— there seems something treacherous about it: but it 
ought to be done, for all that! You don't want so 
very much of it — I don't suppose that Boswell has got 
down a millionth part of all Johnson said — you just 
want specimens — enough to give the feeling of it and 
the quality of it. One doesn't want immensely long 
biographies — just enough to make you feel that you 
have seen a man and sat with him and heard him talk 
— and the kind of way in which he dealt with things and 
people. I'll tell you a man who would have made a 
magnificent biography — Lord Melbourne. He had a 



322 Father Payne 

great charm, and a certain whimsical and fantastic 
humour, which made him do funny little undignified 
things, like a child. But every single dictum of Mel- 
bourne's has got something original and graceful about 
it — always full of good sense, never pompous, always 
with a delicious lightness of touch. The only person 
who took the trouble to put down Melbourne's 
sayings, just as they came out, was Queen Victoria 
— but then she was in love with him without knowing 
it: and in the end he got stuck into the heaviest and 
most ponderous cf biographies, and is lost to the world. 
Stale politics — there's nothing to beat them for dul- 
ness unutterable ! " 

"But isn't it an almost impossible thing," I said, 
"to expect a man who is a first-rate writer, with am- 
bitions in authorship, to devote himself to putting 
down things about some interesting person with the 
chance of their never being published? Very few 
people would have sufficient self-abnegation for that. " 

"That's true enough," said Father Payne, "and 
of course it is a risk — a man must run the risk of sacri- 
ficing a good deal of his time and energy to recording 
unimportant details, perhaps quite uselessly, but with 
this possibility ahead of him, that he may produce 
an immortal book — and I grant you that the infernal 
vanity and self-glorification of authors is a real diffi- 
culty in the way. " 

He was silent for a minute or two, and then he 
said: "Now, I'll tell you another difficulty, that at 
present people only want biographies of men of 
affairs, of big performers, men who have done things — 
I don't want that. I want biographies of people who 
wielded a charm of personality, even if they didn't 
do things — people, I mean, who deserve to live and to 



Of Biography 323 

be loved. — Those are the really puzzling figures . a 
generation later, the men who lived in an atmosphere 
of admiring and delighted friendship, radiating a sort 
of enchanting influence, having the most extravagant 
things said and believed about them by their friends, 
and yet never doing anything in particular. People, 
I mean, like Arthur Hallam, whose letters and remains 
are fearfully pompous and tiresome — and who yet 
had In Memoriam written about him, and who was 
described by Gladstone as the most perfect human 
being, physically, intellectually, and morally, he had 
ever seen. Then there is Browning's Domett — the 
prototype of Waring — and Keats's friend James Rice, 
and Stevenson's friend Ferrier — that's a matchless 
little biographical fragment, Stevenson's letter about 
Ferrier — those are the sort of figures I mean, the men 
who charmed and delighted everyone, were brave and 
humorous, gave a pretty turn to everything they said 
— those are the roses by the wayside! They had 
ill-health some of them, they hadn't the requisite 
toughness for work, they even took to drink, or went 
to the bad. But they are the people of quality and 
tone, about whom one wants to know much more than 
about sunburnt and positive Generals — the strong 
silent sort — or overworked politicians bent on concili- 
ating the riff-raff. I don't want to know about men 
simply because they did honest work, and still less 
about men who never dared to say what they thought 
and felt. You can't make a striking picture out of a 
sense of responsibility! I'm not underrating good 
work — it's fine in every way, but it can't always be 
written about. There are exceptions, of course. 
Nelson and Wellington would have been splendid sub- 
jects, if any one had really Boswellized them. But 



324 Father Payne 

Nelson had a theatrical touch about him, and became 
almost too romantic a hero; while the Duke had a 
fund of admirable humour and almost grotesque 
directness of expression, — and he has never been half 
done justice to, though you can see from Lord Mahon's 
little book of Table Talk and Benjamin Haydon's 
Diary and the letters to Miss J., what a rich affair it 
all might have been, if only there had been a perfectly 
bold, candid, and truthful biographer." 

"But the charming people of whom you spoke," 
I said — "isn't the whole thing often too evanescent 
to be recorded?" 

"Not a bit of it!" said Father Payne, "and these 
are the people we want to hear about, because they 
represent the fine flower of civilization. If a man has 
a delightful friend like that, always animated, fresh, 
humorous, petulant, original, he couldn't do better 
than observe him, keep scraps of his talk, record scenes 
where he took a leading part, get the impression down. 
It may come to nothing, of course, but it may also 
come to something worth more than a thousand 
twaddling novels. The immense use of it — if one 
must think about the use — is that such a life might 
really show commonplace and ordinary people how to 
handle the simplest materials of life with zest and 
delicacy. Novels don't really do that — they only 
make people want to escape from middle-class con- 
ditions. What everyone is the better for seeing is not 
how life might conceivably be handled, but how it 
actually has been handled, freshly and distinctly, by 
someone in a commonplace milieu. Life isn't a bit 
romantic, but it is devilish interesting. It doesn't 
go as you want it to go. Sometimes it lags, sometimes 
it dances; and horrible things happen, often most 



Of Biography 325 

unexpectedly. In the novel, everything has to be 
rounded off and led up to, and you never get a notion 
of the inconsequence of life. The interest of life is 
not what happens, but how it affects people, how they 
meet it, how they fly from it: the relief of a biography 
is that you haven't got to invent your setting and 
your character — all that is done for you: you have 
just got to select the characteristic things, and not to 
blur the things that you would have wished otherwise. 
For God's sake, let us get at the truth in books, and 
not use them as screens to keep the fire off, or as 
things to distract one from the depressing facts in 
one's bank-book. I welcome all this output of novels, 
because it at least shows that people are interested in 
life, and trying to shape it. But I don't want romance, 
and I don't want ugly and sensational realism either. 
That is only romance in another shape. I want real 
men and women — not from an autobiographical point 
of view, because that is generally romantic too — but 
from the point of view of the friends to whom they 
showed themselves frankly and naturally, and without 
that infernal reticence which is not either reverence or 
chivalry, but simply an inability to face the truth, — 
which is the direct influence of the spirit of evil. 
If one of my young men turns out a good biography 
of an interesting person, however ineffective he was, 
I shall not have lived in vain. For, mind this — very 
few people's performances are worth remembering, 
while very many people's personalities are." 



LIX 

OF EXCLUSIVENESS 

ROSE told a story one night which amused Father 
Payne immensely. He had been up in town, 
and had sat next a Minister's wife, who had been 
very confidential. She had said to Rose that her 
husband had just been elected into a small dining-club 
well known in London, where the numbers were very 
limited, the society very choice, and where a single 
negative vote excluded a candidate. " I don't think, " 
said the good lady, "that my husband has ever been 
so pleased at anything that has befallen him, not even 
when he was first given office — such a distinguished 
club — and so exclusive!" 

Father Payne laughed loud and shrill. "That's 
human nature at its nakedest!" he said. "It's like 
Miss Tox, in Dombey and Son, you know, who, when 
Dombey asked her if the school she recommended was 
select, said, 'It's exclusion itself!' What people love 
is the power of being able to exclude — not necessarily 
disagreeable people or tiresome people, but simply 
people who would like to be inside — 

"'Loving not, hating not, just choosing so.' 

"Those are the two great forces of society, you know 
— the exclusive force, and the inclusive force : the force 
that says, ' We few, we happy few, we band of broth- 
326 



Of Exclusiveness 327 

ers ' ; and the force which says, ' The more the merrier. ' 
The exclusive force is represented by caste and class, 
by gentility and donnishness, by sectarianism and 
nationalism, and even by patriotism — and the inclu- 
sive force is represented by Walt Whitmanism and 
Christianity." 

"But what about St. Paul's words, " said Lestrange, 
"'Honour all men: love the brotherhood'?" 

"That's an attempt to recognize both," said 
Father Payne, smiling. "Of course you can't love 
everyone equally — that's the error of democracy — 
democracy is really one of the exclusive forces, because 
it excludes the heroes — it is 'mundus contra Athana- 
sium,' — it is best illustrated by what the American 
democrat said to Charles Kingsley, 'My principle is 
"whenever you see a head above the crowd, hit it.'" 
Democracy is, at its worst, the jealousy of the average 
man for the superior man." 

"But which is the best principle?" said Vincent. 

"Both are necessary," said Father Payne. "One 
must aim at inclusiveness, of course: and we must 
be quite certain that we exclude on the ground of 
qualities, and not on the ground of superficial differ- 
ences. The best influences in the world arise not from 
individuals but from groups — and there is no sort of 
reason why groups should spoil their intensive qualities 
by trying to admit outsiders. The strength of a group 
lies in the fact that one gets the sense of fellowship 
and common purpose, of sympathy and encour- 
agement. A man who has to fight a battle single- 
handed is always tempted to wonder whether, after 
all, it is worth all the trouble and misunderstanding. 
But, on the other hand, you are at liberty to mistrust 
the men who say that they don't want to know people. 



328 Father Payne 

Do you remember how Charles Lamb once said, 'I 
do hate the Trotters!' 'But I thought you didn't 
know them?' said someone. 'That's just it,' said 
Charles Lamb,' I never can hate anyone that I know!' 
The best bred man is the man who finds it easy to get 
on with everybody on equal terms : but it's part of the 
snobbishness of human nature that exclusiveness is 
rather admired than otherwise. There's a delight- 
fully exclusive woman in one of Henry James's novels, 
who refuses to be introduced to a family. She entirely 
declines, and the man who is anxious to effect the 
introduction says, 'I can't think why you object to 
them. ' ' They are hopelessly vulgar, ' says the incisive 
lady, 'and in this short life, that is enough!' But 
St. Paul's remark is really very good, because it means, 
'Treat everyone with courtesy — but reserve your fine 
affections forthe inner circle, whose worth you really 
know!' — it's a better theory than that of the man who 
said, 'It is enough for me to be with those whom I 
love!' That's rather inhuman. " 

"Do you remember," said Barthrop, "the lines 
in Tennyson's Guinevere, which sum up the knightly 
attributes? 

"'High thought, and amiable words, 
And courtliness, and the desire of fame, 
And love of truth, and all that makes a man.'" 

"That's very interesting and curious!" said Father 
Payne. "Dear me, I had forgotten that — did Tenny- 
son say that? — Come — let's have it again!" 

Barthrop repeated the lines again. 

"Now, that's the gentlemanly ideal of the sixties," 
said Father Payne, "and, good heavens, how offensive 
it sounds ! The most curious part of it really is ' the 



Of Exclusiveness 329 

desire of fame' — of course, a hundred years ago, no 
one made any secret of that ! You remember Nelson's 
frank confession, made not once, but many times, 
that he pursued glory. 'Defeat — or Westminster 
Abbey' — didn't he say that?" 

"But surely people pursue fame as much as ever?" 
said Vincent. 

"I daresay," said Father Payne, "but it isn't 
now considered good taste to say so. You have got 
to pretend, at all events, that you wish to benefit 
humanity nowadays. If a man had said to Ruskin 
or Carlyle, 'Why do you write all these books?' and 
they replied, ' It is because of my desire for fame, ' it 
would have been thought vulgar. There's that odd 
story of Robert Browning, when he received an ova- 
tion at Oxford, and someone said to him, 'I suppose 
you don't care about all this,' he said, 'It is what I 
have waited for all my life ! ' I wonder if he did say it ! 
I think he must have done, because it is exactly the 
sort of thing that one is supposed not to say — and I 
confess I don't like it — it seems to me vain, and not 
proud. I don't mind a kind of pride — I think a man 
ought to know what he is worth: but I hate vanity. 
Perhaps that's only because I haven't been a success 
myself." 

"But mayn't you desire fame?" said Vincent. 
"It seems to me rather priggish to condemn it!" 

"Many fine things sound priggish when they are 
said, " said Father Payne. "But, to be frank, I don't 
think that a man ought to desire fame. I think he 
may desire to do a thing well. I don't think he ought 
to desire to do it better than other people. It is the 
wanting to beat other people which is low. Why not 
wish them to do it well too?" 



330 Father Payne 

"You mean that the difference between pride and 
vanity lies there?" said Barthrop. 

"Yes, I do," said Father Payne, "and it is a pity 
that pride is included in the deadly sins, because the 
word has changed its sense. Pride used to mean the 
contempt of others — that's a deadly sin, if you like. 
It used to mean a ghastly sort of self-satisfaction, 
arrived at by comparison of yourself with others. 
But now to be called a proud man is a real compliment. 
It means that a man can't condescend to anything 
mean or base. We ought all to be proud — not proud 
of anything, because that is vulgar, but ashamed of 
doing anything which we know to be feeble or low. 
The Pharisee in the parable was vain, not proud, be- 
cause he was comparing himself with other people. 
But it is all right to be grateful to God for having a 
sense of decency, just as you may be grateful for hav- 
ing a sense of beauty. The hatefulness of it comes in 
when you are secretly glad that other people love 
indecency and ugliness." 

"That is the exclusive feeling then?" said Barthrop. 

"Yes, the bad kind of exclusiveness, " said Father 
Payne — ' ' the kind of exclusiveness which ministers to 
self-satisfaction. And that is the fault of the group 
when it becomes a coterie. The coterie means a set 
of inferior people, bolstering up each other's vanity 
by mutual admiration. In a coterie you purchase 
praise for your own bad work, by pretending to admire 
the bad work of other people. But the real group is 
interested, not in each other's fame, but in the common 
work. " 

" It seems to me confusing, " said Vincent. 

"Not a bit of it," said Father Payne; "we have 
to consider our limitations : we are limited by time and 



Of Exclusiveness 331 

space. You can't know everybody and love every- 
body and admire everybody — and you can't sacrifice 
the joy and happiness of real intimacy with a few for 
a diluted acquaintance with five hundred people. 
But you mustn't think that your own group is the 
only one — that is the bad exclusiveness — you ought 
to think that there are thousands of intimate groups 
all over the world, which you could love just as enthu- 
siastically as you love your own, if you were inside 
them: and then, apart from your own group, you 
ought to be prepared to find reasonable and amiable 
and companionable people everywhere, and to be 
able to put yourself in line with them. Why, good 
heavens, there are millions of possible friends in the 
world ! and one of my deepest and firmest hopes about 
the next world, so to speak, is that there will be some 
chance of communicating with them all at once, 
instead of shutting ourselves up in a frowsy room like 
this, smelling of meat and wine. I don't deny you 
are very good fellows, but if you think that you are 
the only fit and desirable company in the world for 
me or for each other, I tell you plainly that you are 
utterly mistaken. That's why I insist on your travel- 
ling about, to avoid our becoming a coterie. " 

"Then it comes to this," said Vincent drily, "that 
you can't be inclusive, and that you ought not to be 
exclusive?" 

"Yes, that's exactly it!" said Father Payne. 
"You meant to shut me up with one of our patent 
Oxford epigrams, I know — and, of course, it is deuced 
smart! But put it the other wajr round, and it's all 
right. You can't help being exclusive, and you must 
try to be inclusive — that's the truth, with the Oxford 
tang taken out!" 



33 2 Father Payne 

We laughed at this, and Vincent reddened. 

"Don't mind me, old man!" said Father Payne, 
"but try to make your epigrams genial instead of 
contemptuous — inclusive rather than exclusive. They 
are just as true, and the bitter flavour is fit only for 
the vitiated taste of Dons." And Father Payne 
stretched out a large hand down the table, and en- 
closed Vincent's in his own. 

"Yes, it was a nasty turn," said Vincent, smiling. 
" I see what you mean. " 

"The world is a friendlier place than people know, " 
said Father Payne. "We have inherited a suspicion 
of the unknown and the unfamiliar. Don't you 
remember how the ladies in The Mill on the Floss 
mistrusted each other's recipes, and ate dry bread in 
other houses rather than touch jam or butter made on 
different methods? That is the old bad taint. But 
I think we are moving in the right direction. I fancy 
that the awakening may be very near, when we shall 
suddenly realize that we are all jolly good fellows, and 
wonder that we have been so blind. " 

"A Roman Catholic friend of mine," said Rose — 
"he is a priest — told me that he attended a clerical 
dinner the other day. The health of the Pope was 
proposed, and they all got up and sang, 'For he's a 
jolly good fellow!'" 

There was a loud laugh at this. "I like that," 
said Father Payne, "I like their doing that! I 
expect that that is exactly what the Pope is! I 
should dearly love to have a good long quiet talk with 
him! I think I could let in a little light: and I 
should like to ask him if he enjoyed his fame, dear 
old boy: and whether he was interested in his work! 
' Why, Mr. Payne, it's rather anxious work, you know, 



Of Exclusiveness 333 

the care of all the churches ' — I can hear him saying — 
' but I rub along, and the time passes quickly ! though 
to be sure, I'm not as young as I was once: and while 
I am on the subject, Mr. Payne, you look to me to 
be getting on in years yourself ! ' And then I should 
say, 'Yes, your Holiness, I am a man that has seen 
trouble.' And he would say, ' I'm sorry to hear that! 
Tell me all about it!' That's how we should talk, 
like old friends, in a snug parlour in the Vatican, 
looking out on the gardens!" 



LX 

OF TAKING LIFE 

I WAS walking with Father Payne one hot summer 
day upon a field-path he was very fond of. There 
was a copse, through the middle of which the little 
river, the Fyllot, ran. It was the boundary of the 
Aveley estate, and it here joined another stream, 
the Rode, which came in from the south. The path 
went through the copse, dense with hazels, and there 
was always a musical sound of lapsing waters hidden 
in the wood. The birds sang shrill in the thicket, and 
Father Payne said, "This is the juncture of Pison 
and Hiddekel, you know, rivers of Paradise. Aveley 
is Havilah, where the gold is good, and where there is 
bdellium, if we only knew where to look for it. I fancy 
it is rich in bdellium. I came down here, I remember, 
the first day I took possession. It was wonderful, 
after being so long among the tents of Kedar, to plant 
my flag in Havilah; I made a vow that day — I don't 
know if I have kept it!" 

"What was that?" I said. 

"Only that I would not get too fond of it all," 
said Father Payne, smiling, "and that I would share 
it with other people. But I have got very fond of 
it, and I haven't shared it. Asking people to stay 
with you, that they may see what a nice place you 
have to live in, is hardly sharing it. It is rather 
334 



Of Taking Life 335 

the other way — the last refinement of possession, in 
fact!" 

"It's very odd," he went on, "that I should love 
this little bit of the world so much as I do. It's 
called mine — that's a curious idea. I have got very 
little power over it. I can't prevent the trees and 
flowers from growing here, or the birds from nesting 
here, if they have a mind to do so. I can only keep 
human beings out of it, more or less. And yet I love 
it with a sort of passion, so that I want other people to 
love it too. I should like to think that after I am gone 
someone would come here and see how exquisitely 
beautiful it is, and wish to keep it and tend it. That's 
what lies behind the principle of inheritance; it 
isn't the money or the position only that we desire 
to hand on to our children — it's the love of the earth 
and all that grows out of it ; and possession means the 
desire of keeping it unspoiled and beautiful. I could 
weep at the idea of this all being swept away, and a 
bdellium-mine being started here, with a factory- 
chimney and rows of little houses; and yet I suppose 
that if the population increased, and the land was all 
nationalized, a great deal of the beauty of England 
would go. I hope, however, that the sense of beauty 
might increase too — I don't think the country people 
here have much notion of beauty. They only like 
things to remain as they know them. It's a fearful 
luxury really for a man like myself to live in a land 
like this, so full of old woodland and pasture, which is 
only possible under rich proprietors. I'm an abuse, 
of course. I have got a much larger slice of my native 
soil than any one man ought to have; but I don't 
see the way out. The individual can't dispossess 
himself — it's the system which is wrong. " 



33 6 Father Payne 

He stopped in the middle of the copse, and said: 
"Did you ever see anything so perfectly lovely as 
this place? And yet it is all living in a state of war 
and anarchy. The trees and plants against each 
other, all fighting for a place in the sun. The rabbit 
against the grass, the bird against the worm, the cat 
against the bird. There's no peace here really — it's 
full of terrors ! Only the stream is taking it easy. It 
hasn't to live by taking life, and the very sound of it is 
innocent." 

Presently he said: "This is all cut down every five 
years. It's all made into charcoal and bobbins. 
Then the flowers all come up in a rush ; then the copse 
begins to grow again — I never can make up my mind 
which is most beautiful. I come and help the wood- 
men when they cut the copse. That's pleasant work, 
you know, cutting and binding. I sometimes wonder 
if the hazels hate being slashed about. I expect they 
do; but it can't hurt them much, for up they come 
again. It's the right way to live, of course, to begin 
again the minute you are cut down to the roots, to 
struggle out to the air and sun again, and to give 
thanks for life. Don't you feel yourself as if you were 
good for centuries of living?" 

"I'm not sure that I do," I said. "I don't feel 
as if I had quite got my hand in. " 

"Yes, that's all right for you, old boy," said Father 
Payne. "You are learning to live, and you are living. 
But an old fellow like me, who has got in the way of it, 
and has found out at last how good it is to be alive, 
has to realize that he has got only a fag-end left. I 
don't at all want to die; I've got my hands as full as 
they can hold of pretty and delightful things; and I 
don't at all want to be cut down like the copse, and to 



Of Taking Life 337 

have to build up my branches again. Yes, " he added, 
pondering, "I used to think I should not live long, 
and I didn't much want to, I believe! But now — it's 
almost disgraceful to think how much I prize life, 
and how interesting I find it. Depend upon it, on 
we go! The only thing that is mysterious to me is 
why I love a place like this so much. I don't suppose 
it loves me. I suppose there isn't a beast or a bird, 
perhaps not a tree or a flower, in the place that won't 
be rather relieved when I go back home without having 
killed something. I expect, in fact, that I have left 
a track of death behind me in the grass — little beetles 
and things that weren't doing any harm, and that 
liked being alive. That's pretty beastly, you know, 
but how is one to help it? Then my affection for it 
is very futile. I can't establish a civilized system 
here; I can't prevent the creatures from eating each 
other, or the trees from crowding out the flowers. I 
can't eat or use the things myself, I can't take them 
away with me ; I can only stand and yearn with cheap 
sentiment. 

"And yet," he said after a moment, "there's 
something here in this bit of copse that whispers to 
me beautiful secrets — the sunshine among the stems, 
the rustle of leaves, the wandering breeze, the scent 
and coolness of it all! It is crammed with beauty; 
it is all trying to live, and glad to live. You may say, 
of course, that you don't see all that in it, and it is I 
that am abnormal. But that doesn't explain it away. 
The fact that I feel it is a better proof that it is there 
than the fact that you don't feel it is a proof that it 
isn't there! The only thing about it that isn't 
beautiful to me is the fact that life can't live except 
by taking life — that there is no right to live; and that, 



33 8 Father Payne 

I admit, is disconcerting. You may say to me, 'You 
old bully, crammed with the corpses of sheep and 
potatoes, which you haven't even had the honesty 
to kill for yourself, you dare to come here, and talk 
this stuff about the beauty of it all, and the joy of 
living! If all the bodies of the things you have 
consumed in your bloated life were piled together, it 
would make a thing as big as a whole row of ricks!' 
If you say that, I admit that you take the sentiment 
out of my sails!" 

"But I don't say it," said I. "Who dies if Father 
Payne live?" 

He laughed at this, and clapped me on the back. 
"You're in the same case as I, old man," he said, 
"only you haven't got such a pile of blood and bones 
to your credit! Here, we must stow this talk, or we 
shall become both humbugs and materialists. It's 
a puzzling business, talking! It leads you into some 
very ugly places!" 



LXI 



OF BOOKISHNESS 



I WENT in to see Father Payne one morning about 
some work. He was reading a book with knitted 
brows: he looked up, gave a nod, but no smile, pointed 
to a chair, and I sat down: a minute or two later he 
shut the book — a neat enough little volume — with a 
snap, and skimmed it deftly from where he sat, into 
his large waste-paper basket. This, by the way, was a 
curious little accomplishment of his, — throwing things 
with unerring aim. He could skim more cards across 
a room into a hat than anyone I have ever seen who 
was not a professed student of legerdemain. 

"What are you doing?" I said — "such a nice little 
book!" I rose and rescued the volume, which was a 
careful enough edition of some poems and scraps of 
poems, posthumously discovered, of a well-known 
poet. 

"Pray accept it with my kindest regards," said 
Father Payne. "No, I don't know that I ought to 
give it you. It is the sort of book I object to. " 

"Why?" I said, examining it — "it seems harmless 
enough." 

"It's the wrong sort of literature," said Father 

Payne. "There isn't time, or there ought not to be, 

to go fumbling about with these old scraps. They 

aren't good enough to publish — and what's more, 

339 . 



340 Father Payne 

if the man didn't publish them himself, you may be 
sure he had very good reasons for not doing so. The 
only interest of them is that so good a poet could write 
such drivel, and that he knew it was drivel sufficiently 
well not to publish it. But the man who can edit it 
doesn't know that, and the critics who review it don't 
know it either — it was a respectful review that made 
me buy the rubbish — and as for the people who read 
it, God alone knows what they think of it. It's a 
case of 

" ' Weave a circle round him thrice, 
And close your eyes in holy dread.' 

"You have to shut your eyes pretty tight not to 
see what bosh it all is — it is all this infernal reverence 
paid by people, who have no independence of judg- 
ment, to great reputations. It reminds me of the 
barber who used to cut the Duke of Wellington's hair 
and nails, who made quite a lot of money by selling 
clippings to put in lockets!" 

"But isn't it worth while to see a great poet's 
inferior jottings, and to grasp how he worked?" 
said I. 

"No," said Father Payne; — "at least it would 
be worth while to see how he brought off his good 
strokes, but it isn't worth while seeing how he missed 
his stroke altogether. This deification business is all 
unwholesome. In art, in life, in religion, in literature, 
it's a mistake to worship the saints — you don't make 
them divine, you only confuse things, and bring down 
the divine to your own level. The truth — the truth — 
why can't people see how splendid it is, and that it is 
one's only chance of getting on! To shut your eyes 
to the possibility of the great man having a touch of 



Of Bookishness 34 1 

the commonplace, a touch of the ass, even a touch of 
the knave in him, doesn't ennoble your conception of 
human nature. If you can only glorify humanity 
by telling lies about it, and by ruling out all the flaws 
in it, you end by being a sentimentalist. "See thou 
do it not . . . worship God ! " that's one of the finest 
things in the Bible. Of course it is magnificent to see 
a streak of the divine turning up again and again in 
human nature — but you have got to wash the dirt 
to find the diamond. Believe in the beauty behind 
and in and beyond us all — but don't worship the 
imperfect thing. This sort of book is like selling the 
dirt out of which the diamonds have been washed, and 
which would appear to have gained holiness by con- 
tact. I hate to see people stopping short on the sym- 
bol and the illustration, instead of passing on to the 
truth behind — it's idolatry. It's one degree better 
than worshipping nothing; but the danger of idolatry 
is that you are content to get no further: and that is 
what makes idolatry so ingenious a device of the devil, 
that it persuades people to stop still and not to get on. " 

"But aren't you making too much out of it?" I 
said. "At the worst, this is a harmless literary 
blunder, a foolish bit of hero-worship?" 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "in a sense that is true, 
that these little literary hucksters and pedlars don't 
do any very great harm — I don't mean that they cause 
much mischief: but they are the symptom of a grave 
disease. It is this d — d bookishness which is so unreal, 
I would like to say a word about it to you, if you have 
time, instead of doing our work to-day — for if you will 
allow me to say so, my boy, you have got a touch of 
it about you — only a touch — and I think if I can show 
you what I mean, you can throw it off — I have heard 



34 2 Father Payne 

you say rather solemn things about books! But I 
want you to get through that. It reminds me of the 
talk of ritualists. I have a poor friend who is a very 
harmless sort of parson — but I have heard him talk 
of a bit of ceremonial with tears in his eyes. 'It 
was exquisite, exquisite, ' he will say, — ' the celebrant 
wore a cope — a bit, I believe, of genuine pre-Reforma- 
tion work — of course remounted — and the Gospeller 
and Epistoller had copes so perfectly copied that it 
would have been hard to say which was the real one. 
And then Father Wynne holds himself so nobly — such 
a mixture of humility and pride — a priest ought to 
exhibit both, I think, at that moment? — and his 
gestures are so inevitable — so inevitable — that's 
the only word: there's no sense of rehearsal about it: 
it is just the supreme act of worship expressing itself 
in utter abandonment ' — He will go on like that for an 
hour if he can find a great enough goose to listen to 
him. Now, I don't mean to say that the man hasn't 
a sense of beauty — he has the real ritual instinct, a 
perfectly legitimate branch of art. But he doesn't 
know it's art — he thinks it is religion. He thinks that 
God is preoccupied with such things; 'a full choral 
High Mass, at nine o'clock, that's a thing to live and 
die for, ' I have heard him say. Of course it's a sort of 
idealism, but you must know what you are about, and 
what you are idealizing: and you mustn't think that 
your kind is better than any other kind of idealizing. " 

He made a pause, and then held out his hand for the 
book. 

"Now here is the same sort of intemperate rapture, " 
he said. "Look at this introduction ! 'It is his very 
self that his poems give, and the sharpest jealousy of 
his name and fame is enkindled by them. Not to 



Of Bookishness 343 

find him there, his passion, endurance, faith, rapture, 
despair, is merely a confession of want in ourselves. ' 
That's not sane, you know — it's the intoxication of the 
Corybant! It isn't the man himself we want to fix 
our eyes upon. He felt these things, no doubt: but 
we mustn't worship his raptures — we must worship 
what he worshipped. This sort of besotted agitation 
is little better than a dancing dervish. The poems are 
little sparks, struck out from a scrap of humanity by 
some prodigious and glorious force: but we must 
worship the force, not the spark: the spark is only an 
evidence, a system, a symbol if you like, of the force. 
And then see how utterly the man has lost all sense of 
proportion — he has spent hours and days in identifying 
with uncommon patience the exact date of these 
tepid scraps, and he says he is content to have laid a 
single stone in the 'unamended, unabridged, authentic 
temple' of his idol's fame. That seems to me simply 
degrading: and then the portentous ass, whose review 
I read, says that if the editor had done nothing else, 
he is sure of an honoured place for ever in the hierarchy 
of impeccable critics! And what is all this jabber 
about — a few rhymes which a man made when he was 
feeling a little off colour, and which he did not think it 
worth while to publish ! 

"You mustn't get into this kind of a mess, my boy. 
The artist mustn't indulge in emotion for the sake of 
the emotion. 'The weakness of life,' says this pom- 
pous ass, 'is that it deviates from art!' You might 
just as well say that the weakness of food was that it 
deviated from a well-cooked leg of mutton! Art is 
just an attempt to disentangle something, to get at 
one of the big constituents of life. It helps you to see 
clearly, not to confuse one thing with another, not to 



344 Father Payne 

be vaguely impressed — the hideous danger of book- 
ishness is that it is one of the blind alleys into which 
people get. These two fellows, the editor and his 
critic, have got stuck there: they can't see out: they 
think their little valley is the end of the world. I 
expect they are both of them very happy men, as 
happy as a man who goes to bed comfortably drunk. 
But, good God, the awakening!" Father Payne 
relapsed into a long silence, with knitted brows. I 
tried to start him afresh. 

"But you often tell us to be serious, to be deadly 
earnest, about our work?" I said. 

"Oh yes," said Father Payne, "that's another 
matter. We have to work hard, and put the best 
of ourselves into what we do. I don't want you to be 
an amiable dilettante. But I also want you to see 
past even the best art. You mustn't think that the 
stained-glass window is the body of heaven in its 
clearness. The sort of worshippers I object to are the 
men who shut themselves up in a church, and what 
with the colour and the music and the incense-smoke, 
think they are in heaven already. It's an intoxication, 
all that. I don't get you men to come here to make 
you drunk, but to get you to loathe drunkenness. 
God — that's the end of it all! God, who reveals 
Himself in beauty and kindness, and trustfulness, and 
charm and interest, and in a hundred pure and fine 
forces — yet each of them are but avenues which lead 
up to Him, the streets of the city, full of living water. 
But it is movement I am in search of — and I would 
rather be drowned in the depth of the sea than mislead 
anyone, or help him to sit still. I have made an awful 
row about it all," said Father Payne, relapsing into a 
milder mood — "But you will forgive me, I know. I 



Of Bookishness 345 

can't bear to see these worthy men blocking the way 
with their unassailable, unabridged, authentic edi- 
tions. They are like barbed-wire entanglements : and 
the worst of it is that, in spite of all their holy air of 
triumph, they enjoy few things more than tripping 
each other up! They condemn each other to eternal 
perdition for misplacing a date or misspelling a name. 
It's like getting into a bed of nettles to get in among 
these little hierophants. They remind me of the 
bishops at some ancient Church Council or other who 
tore the clothes off two right reverend consultants, 
and literally pulled them limb from limb in the name 
of Christ. That's the end of these holy raptures, my 
boy! They unchain the beast within. " 



LXII 

OF CONSISTENCY 

THERE had been a little vague talk about politics, 
and someone had quoted a definition of a true 
Liberal as a man who, if he had only to press a button 
in a dark room to annihilate all cranks, faddists, 
political quacks, extremists, propagandists, and nos- 
trum-mongers, would not dream of doing so, as a matter 
of conscience, on the ground that everyone has a right 
to hold his own beliefs and to persuade the world to 
accept them if he can. Father Payne laughed at this; 
but Rose, who had been nettled, I fancy, at a lack of 
deference for his political experience, his father being 
a Unionist M.P., said loudly, "Hear, hear! that's the 
only sort of Liberal whom I respect. " 

A look of sudden anger passed over Father Payne's 
face — unmistakable and uncompromising wrath. 
"Come, Rose," he said, "this isn't a political meeting ; 
and even if it were, why proclaim yourself as accepting 
a definition which is almost within the comprehension 
of a chimpanzee?" 

There was a faint laugh at this, but everyone had 
an uncomfortable sense of thunder in the air. Rose 
got rather white, and his nostrils expanded. "I'm 
sorry I put it in that way," he said rather frostily, 
"if you object. But I mean it, I think. I don't 
like diluted Liberalism." 

346. 



Of Consistency 347 

"Yes, but you beg the question by calling it diluted," 
said Father Payne. "If anyone had said that the 
only Tory he respected was a man who if he could 
press a button in a still darker room, and by doing so 
bring it to pass that all institutions on the face of the 
earth would remain immutably fixed for ever and ever, 
would feel himself bound conscientiously to do it, 
you wouldn't accept that as a definition of Conserva- 
tism? These things are not hard and fast matters of 
principle — they are only tendencies. Toryism is an 
instinct to trust custom and authority, Liberalism is an 
instinct to welcome development and change. All 
that the definition of Liberalism which was quoted 
means is, that the Liberal has a. deep respect for free- 
dom of opinion; and all that my grotesque definition 
of Toryism means is that a Tory prefers to trust a 
fixed tradition. But, of course, both want a settled 
Government, and both have to recognize that the 
world and its conditions change. The Tory says, 
' Look before you leap ' ; the Liberal says, ' Leap before 
you look. ' But it is really all a matter of infinite 
gradations, and what differentiates people is merely 
their idea of the pace at which things can go and ought 
to go. Why should you say that you can only respect 
a man who wants to go at sixty miles an hour, any 
more than I should say I can only respect a man who 
wants to remain absolutely still?" 

Rose had by this time recovered his temper, and 
said, "It was rather crude, I admit. But what I 
meant was that if a man feels that all opinions are 
of equal value, he must give full weight to all opinions. 
The doctrinaire Liberal seems to me to be just as much 
inclined to tyrannize as the doctrinaire Tory, and to 
use his authority on the side of suppression when 



34 8 Father Payne 

it is convenient to do so, and against all his own 
principles." 

"I don't think that is quite fair," said Father 
Payne. "You must have a working system; you 
can't try everyone's experiments. All that the Liberal 
says is, 'Persuade us if you can.' Pure Liberalism 
would be anarchy, just as pure Toryism would be 
tyranny. Both are intolerable. But just as the 
Liberal has to compromise and say, 'This may not be 
the ultimate theory of the Government, but mean- 
while the world has to be governed, ' so the Tory has 
to compromise, if a large majority of the people say, 
'We will not be governed by a minority for their 
interest; we will be governed for our own.' The 
parliamentary vote is just a way of avoiding civil war; 
you can't always resort to force, so you resort to arbi- 
tration. But why the Liberal position is on the whole 
the stronger is because it says frankly, 'If you Tories 
can persuade the nation to ask you to govern it, we 
will obey you. ' The weakness of the Tory position 
is that it has to make exactly the same concessions, 
while it claims to be inspired by a divine sort of know- 
ledge as to what is just and right. I personally mis- 
trust all intuitions which lead to tyranny. Of course, 
the weakness of the whole affair is that the man who 
believes in democracy has to assume that all have 
equal rights; that would be fair enough if all people 
were born equal in character and ability, and influ- 
ence and wealth. But that isn't the case; and so the 
Liberal says, 'Democracy is a bad system perhaps, 
but it is the only system, ' and it is fairer to maintain 
that everyone who gets into the world has as good a 
right as anyone else to be there, than it is to say, 
'Some people have a right to manage the world and 



Of Consistency 349 

some have only a duty to obey. ' Both represent a 
side of the truth, but neither represents the whole 
truth. At worst Liberalism is a combination of the 
weak against the strong, and Toryism a combination 
of the strong against the weak ! I personally wish the 
weak to have a chance; but what we all really desire is 
to be governed by the wise and good, and my hope 
for the world is that the quality of it is improving. 
I want the weak to become sensible and self -restrained, 
and the strong to become unselfish and disinterested. 
It is generosity that I want to see increase — it is the 
finest of all qualities — the desire, I mean, to serve 
others, to admire, to sympathize, to share, to rejoice, 
in other people's happiness. That would solve all our 
difficulties." 

"Yes, of course," said Rose. "But I would like 
to go back again, and say that what I was praising 
was consistency. " 

"But there is no such thing," said Father Payne, 
"except in combination with entire irrationality. 
One can't say at any time of one's life, ' I know every- 
thing worth knowing. I am in a position to form a 
final judgment.' You can say, 'I will shut off all 
fresh light from my mind, and I will consider no 
further evidence,' but that isn't a thing to respect! 
I begin to suspect, Rose, that why you praised the 
uncompromising Liberal, as you call him, is because 
he is the only kind of opponent who isn't dangerous. 
A man who takes up such a position as I have described 
is practically insane. He has a fixed idea, which 
neither argument nor evidence can alter. The un- 
compromising man of fixed opinions, whatever those 
opinions may be, is almost the only man I do not 
respect, because he is really the only inconsistent 



35° Father Payne 

person. He says, ' I have formed an opinion which is 
based on experience, and I shall not alter it. ' That is 
tantamount to saying that you have done with ex- 
perience; it is a claim to have attained infallibility 
through fallible faculties. Where is the dignity of 
that? It's just a deification of stupidity and stub- 
bornness and insolence and complacency." 

"But you must take your stand on some certain- 
ties," said Rose. 

1 ' The fewer the better, " said Father Payne. " One 
may learn to discriminate between things, and to 
observe differences; but that is very different from 
saying that you have got at the ultimate essence of 
any one thing. I am all for clearness — we ought not 
to confuse things with each other, or use the same 
names for different things; but I'm all against claim- 
ing absolute and impeccable knowledge. It may be a 
comfortable system for a man who doesn't want to 
be bothered; but he is only deferring the bother — he 
is like a man who stays in bed because he doesn't like 
dressing. But it isn't a solution to stay in bed — it 
is only suspending the solution. No, we mustn't have 
any regard for human consistency — it's a very paltry 
attribute; it's the opposite of anthropomorphism. 
That makes out God to be in the image of man, but 
consistency claims for man the privilege of God. 
And that isn't wholesome, you know, either for a man 
or his friends!" 

"I give up," said Rose: "can nothing be logical?" 

"Hardly anything," said Father Payne, "except 
logic itself. You have to coin logical ideas into 
counters to play with. No two things, for instance, 
can ever be absolutely equal, except imaginary equal- 
ities — and that's the mischief of logic applied to life, 



Of Consistency 351 

that it presumes an exact valuation of the ideas it 
works with, when no two people's valuations of the 
same idea are identical, and even one person's valua- 
tion varies from time to time; and logic breeds a 
phantom sort of consistency which only exists in the 
imagination. You know the story of how Smith and 
Jones were arguing, and Smith said, ' Brown will agree 
with me': 'Yes,' said Jones triumphantly, 'he will, 
but for my reasons!'" 



LXIII 

OF WRENS AND LILIES 

IT was the first warm and sunny day, after a cold 
and cloudy spring: I took a long and leisurely 
walk with Father Payne down a valley among woods, 
of which Father Payne was very fond. "Almost 
precipitous for Northamptonshire, eh?" he used to 
say. I was very full of a book I had been reading, but 
I could not get him to talk. He made vague and 
foolish replies, and said several times, "I shall have to 
think that over, you know," which was, I well knew, 
a polite intimation that he was not in a mood for 
talk. But I persisted, and at last he said, "Hang it, 
you know, I'm not attending — I'm very sorry — it 
isn't your fault — but there's such a lot going on every- 
where. " He quoted a verse of The Shropshire Lad, of 
which he was very fond : 

" ' Now, of my threescore years and ten, 
Twenty will not come again, 
And take from seventy springs a score, 
It only leaves me fifty more;'" 

adding, "That's the only instance I know of a sub- 
traction sum made into perfect poetry — but it's the 
other way round, worse luck! 

"And add to seventy springs a score, 

That only leaves me forty more!" 

352 



Of Wrens and Lilies 353 

The birds were singing very sweetly in the copses 
as we passed — "That isn't art, I believe," said 
Father Payne. "It's only the reproductive instinct, 
I am told ! I wish it took such an artistic form in my 
beloved brothers in the Lord! There," he added, 
stopping and speaking in a low tone; "don't move — 
there's a cock- wren singing his love-song — you can see 
his wings quivering. " There followed a little tremolo, 
with four or five emphatic notes for a finish. "Now, 
if you listen, you'll hear the next wren answer him!" 
said Father Payne. In a moment the same little song 
came like an echo from a bush a few yards away. 
"The wren sings in stricter time than any bird but the 
cuckoo," said Father Payne — "four quavers to a 
bar. That's very important! Those two ridiculous 
creatures will go on doing that half the morning. 
They are so excited that they build sham nests, you 
know, about now — quite useless piles of twigs and 
moss, not intended for eggs, just to show what they 
can do. But that little song! It has all the passion 
of the old chivalry in it — it is only to say, ' My Dul- 
cinea is prettier, sweeter, brighter-eyed than yours!' 
and the other says, ' You wait till I can get at you, and 
then we will see ! ' If they were two old knights, they 
would fight to the death over it, till the world had lost 
a brave man, and one of the Dulcineas was a hapless 
widow, and nothing proved. That's the sort of thing 
that men admire, full of fine sentiment. Why can't 
we leave each other alone? Why does loving one 
person make you want to fight another? Just look 
at that wren: he's as full of joy and pride as he can 
hold : look at the angle at which he holds his tail : he 
feels the lord of the world, sure enough!" 

We walked on, and I asked no more questions. 



354 Father Payne 

"There's a bit of colour," said Father Payne, pointing 
to a bare wood, all carpeted with green blades. 
"That's pure emerald, like the seventh foundation of 
the city. Now, if I ask you, who are a bit of a poet, 
what those leaves are, what do you say? You say 
hyacinth or daffodil, or perhaps lily-of-the- valley. 
But what does the simple botanist — that's me — say? 
Garlic, my boy, and nothing else! and you had better 
not walk musing there, or you will come in smelling 
of spring onions, like a greengrocer's shop. So much 
for poetry ! It's the loveliest green in creation, and it 
has a pretty flower too — but it's never once mentioned 
in English poetry, so far as I know. And yet Keats 
had the face to say that Beauty was Truth and Truth 
Beauty! That's the way we play the game." 

We rambled on, and passed a pleasant old stone- 
built cottage in the wood, with a tiny garden. "It's 
a curious thing," said Father Payne, "but in the 
spring I always want to live in all the houses I see. 
It's the nesting instinct, no doubt. I think I could 
be very happy here, for instance — much happier than 
in my absurd big house, with all you fellows about. 
Why did I ever start it? I ought to have had more 
sense. I want a cottage like this, and a little garden 
to work in, and a few books. I would live on bread 
and cold bacon and cheese and cabbages, with a hive 
of my own honey. I should get wise and silent, and 
not run on like this. " 

A dog came out of the cottage garden, and followed 
us a little way. "Do we belong to your party, sir, 
or do you belong to ours?" said Father Payne. The 
dog put his head on one side, and wagged his tail. 
"It appears I have the pleasure of your acquaint- 
ance!" said Father Payne to him. "Very well, you 



Of Wrens and Lilies 355 

can set us on our way if you like!" The dog gave a 
short shrill bark, and trotted along with us. When 
we got to the end of the lane, where it turned into the 
highroad, Father Payne said to the dog, "Now, sir, 
I expect that's all the time you can spare this morning? 
You must go back and guard the house, and be a faith- 
ful dog. Duty first!" The dog looked mournfully 
at us, and wagged his tail, but did not attempt to come 
farther. He watched us for a little longer, but as we 
did not invite him to come on, he presently turned 
round and trotted off home. "Now, that's the sort 
of case where I feel sentimental," said Father Payne. 
"It's the sham sort of pathos. I hate to see anyone 
disappointed. A person offering flowers in the street 
for sale, and people not buying them — the men in 
London showing off little toys by the pavement, 
which nobody wants — I can't bear that. It makes me 
feel absurdly wretched to see anyone hoping to please, 
and not pleasing. And if the people who do it look 
old and frail and unhappy, I'm capable of buying the 
whole stock. The great uncomforted! It's silly, 
of course, and there is nothing in the world so silly 
as useless emotion! It is so easy to overflow with 
cheap benevolence, but the first step towards the 
joyful wisdom is to be afraid of the emotion that costs 
you nothing: but we won't be metaphysical to-day!" 
Presently Father Payne insisted on sitting down 
in a sheltered place. He flung his hat off, and sat there 
looking round him with a smile, his arms clasped round 
his big knees. "Well, " he said, "it's a jolly place, the 
old world, to be sure! Plenty of nasty and ugly 
things, I suppose, going on in corners ; but if you look 
round, they are only a small percentage of the happy 
things. They don't force themselves upon the eye and 



356 Father Payne 

ear, the beastly things : and it's a stupid and faithless 
mistake to fix the imagination and the reason too 
much upon them. We are all of us in a tight place 
occasionally, and we have to meet it as best we can. 
But I don't think we do it any better by anticipating 
it beforehand. What is more, no one can really help 
us or deliver us: we can be made a little more comfort- 
able, and that's all, by what they call cooling drinks, 
and flowers in a vase by the bedside. And it's a bad 
thing to get the misery of the world in a vague way on 
our nerves. That's the useless emotion. We have 
got certain quite definite things to do for other people 
in our own circle, and we are bound to do them; we 
mustn't shirk them, and we mustn't shirk our own 
troubles, though the less we bother about them the 
better. I am not at all sure that the curse of the 
newspapers is not that they collect all the evils of 
the world into a hideous posy, and thrust it under our 
nose. They don't collect the fine, simple, wholesome 
things. Now you and I are better employed to-day 
in being agreeable to each other — at least you are being 
kind to me, even though I can't talk about that book — 
and in looking at the delightful things going on every- 
where — just think of all the happiness in the world 
to-day, symbolized by that ridiculous wren ! — we are 
better employed, I say, than if we were extending the 
commerce of England, or planning how to make war, 
or scolding people in sermons about their fatal indiffer- 
ence to the things that belong to their peace. Men 
and women must find and make their own peace, and 
we are doing both to-day. That awful vague sense 
of responsibility, that desire to interfere, that wish 
that everyone else would do uncomplainingly what 
we think to be their duty — that's all my eye! It is 



Of Wrens and Lilies 357 

the kindly, eager, wholesome life which affects the 
world, wherever it is lived : and that is the best which 
most of us can do. We can't be always fighting. 
Even the toughest old veteran soldier — how many 
hours of his life has he spent actually under fire? 
No, I'm not forgetting the workers either: but you 
need not tell me that they are all sick at heart because 
they are not dawdling in a country lane. It would 
bore them to death, and they can live a very happy 
life without it. That's the false pathos again — to 
think that everyone who can't do as we like must be 
miserable. And anyhow, I have done my twenty-five 
years on the treadmill, and I am not going to pretend 
it was noble work, because it wasn't. It was useless 
and disgraceful drudgery, most of it!" 

"Ah," I said, "but that doesn't help me. You 
may have earned a holiday, but I have never done any 
real drudgery — I haven't earned anything. " 

"Be content," said Father Payne; "take two 
changes of raiment! You have got your furrow to 
plough — all in good time! You are working hard 
now, and don't let me hear any stuff about being 
ashamed because you enjoy it! The reward of labour 
is life: to enjoy our work is the secret. If you could 
persuade people that the spring of life lies there, you 
would do more for the happiness of man than by 
attending fifty thousand committees. But I won't 
talk any more. I want to consider the lilies of the 
field, how they grow. They don't do it every day!" 



LXIV 

OF POSE 

SOMEONE said rashly, after dinner to-night, that 
the one detestable and unpardonable thing in a 
man was pose. A generalization of this kind acted 
on Father Payne very often like a ferret on a rabbit. 
He had been mournfully abstracted during dinner, 
shaking his head slowly, and turning his eyes to heaven 
when he was asked leading questions. But now he 
said: "I don't think that is reasonable — you might as 
well say that you always disliked length in a book. 
A book has got to be some length — it is as short as it's 
long. Of course, the moment you begin to say, 'How 
long this book is!' you mean that it is too long, and 
excess is a fault. Do you remember the subject pro- 
posed in a school debating society, 'That too much 
athletics is worthy of our admiration'? Pose is like 
that — when you become conscious of pose it is gener- 
ally disagreeable — that is, if it is meant to deceive: 
but it is often amusing too, like the pose of the unjust 
judge in the parable, who prefaces his remarks by 
saying, ' Though I fear not God, neither regard man. ' " 

"Oh, but you know what I mean, Father," said 
the speaker, "the pose of knowing when you don't 
know, and being well-bred when you are snobbish, 
and being kind when you are mean, and so on. " 

"I think you mean humbug rather than pose," 
358 



Of Pose 359 

said Father Payne; "but even so, I don't agree with 
you. I have a friend who would be intolerable, but 
for his pose of being agreeable. He isn't agreeable, 
and he doesn't feel agreeable; but he behaves as if he 
was, and it is the only thing that makes him bearable. 
What you really mean is the pose of superiority — the 
man whose motives are always just ahead of your own, 
and whose taste is always slightly finer, and who knows 
the world a little better. But there is a lot of pose 
that isn't that. What is pose, after all? Can anyone 
define it?" 

"It's an artist's phrase, I think," said Barthrop; 
"it means a position in which you look your best. " 

"Like the Archbishop who was always painted in 
a gibbous attitude — first quarter, you know — with 
his back turned to you, and his face just visible over 
his lawn sleeve, " said Father Payne, "but that was in 
order to hide an excrescence on his left cheek. Do you 
remember what Lamb said of Barry Cornwall's wen 
on the nape of his neck? Someone said that Barry 
Cornwall was thinking of having it cut off. 'I hope 
he won't do that,' said Lamb, 'I rather like it — it's 
redundant, like his poetry!' I rather agree with 
Lamb. I like people to be a little redundant, and a 
harmless pose is pure redundancy : it only means that a 
man is up to some innocent game or other, some sort 
of mystification, and is enjoying himself. It's like 
a summer haze over the landscape. Now, there's 
another friend of mine who was once complimented 
on his 'uplifted' look. Whenever he thinks of it, 
and that's pretty often, he looks uplifted, like a bird 
drinking, with his eyes fixed on some far-off vision. 
I don't mind that! It's only a wish to look his best. 
It's partly a wish to give pleasure, you know. It's the 



360 Father Payne 

same thing that makes people wear their hair long, 
or dress in a flamboyant way. I'll tell you a little 
story. You know Bertie Nash, the artist. I met 
him once in a Post Office, and he was buying a sheet of 
halfpenny stamps. I asked him if he was going to 
send out some circulars. He looked at me sadly, and 
said, 'No, I always use these — I can't use the penny 
stamps — such a crude red!' Now, he didn't do that 
to impress me: but it was a pose in a way, and he 
liked feeling so sensitive to colour. " 

"But oughtn't one to avoid all that sort of non- 
sense?" said someone; "it's better surely to be just 
what you are." 

r "Yes, but what are you, after all?" said Father 
Payne; "your moods vary. It would be hopeless 
if everyone tried to keep himself down to his worst 
level for the sake of sincerity. The point is that 
you ought to try to keep at your best level, even if 
you don't feel so. Hang it, good manners are a pose, 
if it comes to that. The essence of good manners is 
sometimes to conceal what you are feeling. Is it a 
pose to behave amiably when you are tired or cross?" 

"No, but that is in order not to make other people 
uncomfortable," said Vincent. 

"Well, it's very hard to draw the line, " said Father 
Payne: "but what we really mean by pose is, I imag- 
ine, the attempt to appear to be something which you 
frankly are not — and that is where the word has 
changed its sense, Barthrop. An artist's pose is 
something characteristic, which makes a man look his 
best. What we generally mean by pose is the affect- 
ing a best which one never reaches. Come, tell a 
story, someone! That's the best way to get at a 
quality. Won't someone quote an illustration?" 



Of Pose 361 

"What about my friend Pearce, the schoolmaster? " 
said Vincent. "He read a book about schoolmaster- 
ing, and he said he didn't think much of it. He 
added that the author seemed only to be giving elegant 
reasons for doing things which the born schoolmaster 
did by instinct." 

"Well, that's not a bad criticism," said Father 
Payne; "but it was pose if he meant to convey that 
he was a born schoolmaster. Is he one, by the way?" 

"No," said Vincent, "he is not: he is much ragged 
by the boys ; but he comforts himself by thinking that 
all schoolmasters are ragged, but that he is rather 
more successful than most in dealing with it. He has 
a great deal of moral dignity, has Pearce! I don't 
know where he would be without it!" 

"Well, there's an instance," said Father Payne, 
"of a pose being of some use. I think a real genuine 
pose often makes a man do better work in the world 
than if he was drearily conscious of failure. It's 
a game, you know — a dramatic game: and I think it's 
a sign of vitality and interest to want to have a game. 
It's like the lawyer's clerk in Our Mutual Friend, when 
Mr. Boffin calls to keep an appointment, being the 
lawyer's only client; but the boy makes a show of 
looking it all up in a ledger, runs his finger down a list 
of imaginary consultants, and says to himself, 'Mr. 
Aggs, Mr. Baggs, Mr. Caggs, Mr. Daggs, Mr. Boffin — 
Yes, sir, that is right ! ' Now there's no harm in that 
sort of thing — it's only a bit of moral dignity, as 
Vincent says. It's no good acquiescing in being a 
humble average person — we must do better than that ! 
Most people believe in themselves in spite of abun- 
dant evidence to the contrary — but it's better than 
disbelieving in yourself. That's abject, you know." 



362 Father Payne 

"But if you accept the principle of pose," said 
Lestrange, "I don't see that you can find fault with 
any pose." 

"You might as well say," said Father Payne, "that 
if I accept the principle of drinking alcohol, it doesn't 
matter how much I drink! Almost all morality is 
relative — in fact, it is doubtful if it is ever absolute. 
The mischief of pose is not when it makes a man try 
to be or to appear at his best: but when a man lives 
a thoroughly unreal life, taking a high line in theory 
and never troubling about practice, then it's incredible 
to what lengths self-deception can go. Dr. Johnson 
said that he looked upon himself as a polite man ! It 
is quite easy to get to believe yourself impeccable in 
certain points: and as one gets older, and less assail- 
able, and less liable to be pulled up and told the hard 
truth.it is astonishing how serenely you can sail along. 
But that isn't pose exactly. It generally begins by a 
pose, and becomes simple imperviousness : and that is, 
after all, the danger of pose, — that it makes people 
blind to the truth about themselves." 

" I'm getting muddled, " said Vincent. 

"It is rather muddling," said Father Payne, "but 
in a general way, the point is this. When pose is a 
deliberate attempt to deceive other people for your 
own credit, it is detestable. But when it is merely 
harmless drama, to add to the interest of life and to 
retain your own self-respect, it's an amiable foible, and 
need not be discouraged. The real question is whether 
it is assumed seriously, or whether it is all a sort of 
joke. We all like to play our little games, and I find 
it very easy to forgive a person who enjoys dressing 
up, so to speak, and making remarks in character. 
Come, I'll confess my sins in public. If I meet a 



Of Pose 363 

stranger in the roads, I rather like to be thought a 
bluff and hearty English squire, striding about my 
broad acres. I prefer that to being thought a retired 
crammer, a dominie who keeps a school and calls it an 
academy, as Lord Auchinleck said of Johnson. But 
if I pretended in this house to be a kind of abbot, and 
glided about in a cassock with a gold cross round my 
neck, conferring a benediction on everyone, and then 
retired to my room to read a French novel and to 
drink whisky-and-soda, that would be a very un- 
pleasant pose indeed!" 

We all implored Father Payne to adopt it, and he 
said he would give it his serious consideration. 



LXV 

OF REVENANTS 

I WAS sitting in the garden one evening in summer 
with Father Payne and Barthrop. Barthrop was 
going off next day to Oxford, and was trying to per- 
suade Father Payne to go too. 

"No," he said, "I simply couldn't! Oxford is the 
city east of the sun and west of the moon — like as a 
dream when one awaketh ! I don't hold with indulg- 
ing fruitless sentiment, particularly about the past. " 

"But isn't it rather a pity?" said Barthrop. "After 
all, most emotions are useless, if you come to that! 
Why should you cut yourself off from a place you are 
so fond of, and which is quite the most beauti- 
ful place in England too? Isn't it rather — well, — 
weak?" 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "it's weak, no doubt! 
That is to say, if I were differently made, more hard- 
hearted, more sure of myself, I should go, and I should 
enjoy myself, and moon about, and bore you to death 
with old stories about the chimes at midnight — 
everybody would be a dear old boy or a good old soul, 
and I should hand out tips, and get perfectly maudlin 
in the evenings over a glass of claret. That's the 
normal thing, no doubt — that's what a noble-minded 
man in a novel of Thackeray's would do!" 

"Well," said Barthrop, "you know best — but I 
364 



Of Revenants 365 

expect that if you did take the plunge and go there, 
you would find yourself quite at ease. " 

"I might," said Father Payne; "but then I also 
might not — and I prefer not to risk it. You see, it 
would be merely wallowing in sentiment — and I don't 
approve of sentiment. I want my emotions to live 
with, not to bathe in ! " 

"But you don't mind going back to London," said 
Barthrop. 

"No," said Father Payne, "but that bucks me 
up. I was infernally unhappy in London, and it 
puts me in a thoroughly sensible and cheerful mood 
to go and look at the outside of my old lodgings, and 
the place where I used to teach, and to say to myself, 
'Thank God, that's all over!' Then I go on my way 
rejoicing, and make no end of plans. But if I went to 
Oxford, I should just remember how happy and young 
I was ; and I might even commit the folly of regretting 
the lapse of time, and of wishing I could have it back 
again. I don't think it is wholesome to do anything 
which makes one discontented, or anything which 
forces one to dwell on what one has lost. That doesn't 
matter. Nothing really is ever lost, and it only takes 
the starch out of one to think about it from that 
angle. I don't believe in the past. It seems unalter- 
able, and I suppose in a sense it is so. But if you begin 
to dwell on unalterable things, you become a fatalist, 
and I'm always trying to get away from that. The 
point is that no one is unalterable, and, thank God, 
we are always altering. To potter about in the past 
is like grubbing in an ash-heap, and shedding tears 
over broken bits of china. The plate, or whatever 
it is, was pretty enough, and it had its place and its 
use ; and when the stuff of which it is made is wanted 



366 Father Payne 

again, it will be used again. It is simply fatuous to 
waste time over the broken pieces of old dreams and 
visions ; and I mean to use my emotions and my imag- 
ination to see new dreams and finer visions. Perhaps 
the time will come when I can dream no more — the 
brain gets tired and languid, no doubt. But even then 
I shall try to be interested in what is going on." 

"I see your point," said Barthrop; "but, for the 
life of me, I can't see why the old place should not take 
its part in the new visions! When- I go down to 
Oxford I don't regret it. I go gratefully and happily 
about, and I like to see the young men as jolly as I was 
and as unaware what a good time they are having. 
An old pal of mine is a Don, and he puts me up in 
College, and it amuses me to go into Hall, and to see 
some of the young lions at close quarters. It's all 
pure and simple refreshment." 

" I've no doubt of it, old man, " said Father Payne; 
"and it's an excellent thing for you to go, and to draw 
fresh life from the ancient earth, like Antaeus. But 
I'm not made that way. I'm not loyal — that is to 
say, I am not faithful to things simply because I once 
admired and loved them. If you are loyal in the 
right way, as you are, it's different. But these old 
attachments are a kind of idolatry to me — a false 
worship. I'm naturally full of unreasonable devo- 
tion to the old and beautiful things; but they get round 
my neck like a millstone, and it is all so much more 
weight that I have to carry. I sometimes go to see an 
old cousin of mine, a widow in the country, who lives 
entirely in the past, never allows anything to be 
changed in the house, never talks about anyone who 
isn't dead or ill. The woman's life is simply buried 
under old memories, mountains of old china, family 



Of Revenants 367 

plate, receipts for jam and marmalade — everything has 
got to be done as it was in the beginning. Now most 
of her friends think that very beautiful and tender, and 
talk of the old-world atmosphere of the place; but I 
think it simply a stuffy waste of time. I don't tell 
her so — God forbid! But I feel that she is lolling 
in an arbour by the roadside instead of getting on. 
It's innocent enough, but it does not seem to me 
beautiful. " 

"But I still don't see why you give way to the feel- 
ing," said Barthrop. "I'm sure that if I felt as you 
do about Oxford, or any other place, you would tell 
me it was my duty to conquer it. " 

"Very likely!" said Father Payne. "But doctors 
don't feel bound to take their own prescriptions! 
Everyone must decide for himself, and I know that 
I should fall under the luxurious enchantment. I 
should go into cheap raptures, I should talk about 
'the tender grace of a day that is dead' — it's no use 
putting your head in a noose to see what being 
strangled feels like." 

"But do you apply that to everything," I said, 
"old friendships, old affections, old memories? They 
seem to me beautiful, and harmlessly beautiful." 

"Well, if you can use them up quite freshly, and 
make a poetical dish out of them, for present consump- 
tion, I don't mind," said Father Payne. "But that 
isn't my way — I'm not robust enough. It's all I can 
do to take things in as they come along. Of course 
an old memory sometimes goes through one like a 
sword, but I pull it out as quick as I can, and cast it 
away. I am not going to dance with Death if I can 
help it! I have got my job cut out for me, and I am 
not going to be hampered by old rubbish. Mind 



368 Father Payne 

you, I don't say that it was rubbish at the time; but 
I have no use for anything that I can't use. Senti- 
ment seems to me like letting valuable steam off. 
The people I have loved are all there still, whether 
they are dead or alive. They did a bit of the journey 
with me, and I enjoyed their company, and I shall 
enjoy it again, if it so comes about. But we have to 
live our life, and we can't keep more than a certain 
number of things in mind — that is an obvious limita- 
tion. Do you remember the old fairy story of the 
man who carried a magic goose, and everyone who 
touched it, or touched anyone who touched it, could 
not leave go, with the result that there was a long 
train of helpless people trotting about behind the man? 
I don't want to live like that, with a long train of old 
memories and traditions and friendships and furni- 
ture trailing helplessly behind me. My business is 
with my present circle, my present work, and I can't 
waste my strength in drawing about vehicles full of 
goods. If anyone wants me, here I am, and I will do 
my best to meet his wishes; but I am not going to be 
frightened by words like loyalty into pretending that 
I am going to stagger along carrying the whole of my 
past. No, my boy," said Father Payne, turning to 
Barthrop, "you go to Oxford, and enjoy yourself! 
But the old place is too tight about my heart for me to 
put my nose into it. I'm a free man, and I am not 
going to be in bondage to my old fancies. You may 
give my love to Corpus and to Wadham Garden — it's 
all dreadfully bewitching — but I'm not going to run 
the risk of falling in love with the phantom of the past 
— that's La Belle Dame Sans Merci for me, and I'm 
riding on — I'm riding on. I won't have the hussy 
on my horse. 



Of Revenants 369 



"I set her on my pacing steed, 

And nothing else saw all day long, 
For sideways would she lean, and sing 
A faery's song. 

She found me roots of relish sweet, 
And honey wild and manna dew. 
And sure in language strange she said, 
'I love thee true."' 

He stopped a moment, as he often did when he 
made a quotation, overcome with feeling. Then he 
smiled, and added half to himself, "No; I should say 
as Dr. Johnson said to the lady in Fleet Street: 'No, 
no; it won't do, my girl!'" 

24 



LXVI 

OF DISCIPLINE 

"\ X JELL, anyhow," said Vincent at dinner, com- 

V V menting on something that had been said, 
' ' you may not get anything else out of a disagreeable 
affair like that, but you get a sort of discipline." 

"Come, hold on," said Father Payne; "that won't 
do, you know! Discipline, in my belief, is in itself 
a bad thing, unless you not only get something out of 
it, but, what is more, know what you get out of it. 
You can't discipline anyone unless he desires it! 
Discipline means the repressing of something — you 
must be quite sure that it is worth repressing. " 

"What I mean, " said Vincent, "is that it makes you 
tougher and harder. " 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "but that is not a good 
thing in itself, unless there is something soft and 
weak in you. Discipline may easily knock the good 
things out of you. There's a general kind of belief 
that, because the world is a rough place, where 
you may get tumbles and shocks without any fault 
of your own, therefore it is as well to have something 
rough about you. I don't believe in that. The 
reason why a man gets roughly handled, in nine cases 
out of ten, is not because he is obnoxious or of- 
fensive, but because other people are harsh and 
indifferent. I want to apply discipline to the brutal, 
37o 



Of Discipline 371 

not to brutalize the sensitive. If discipline simply 
made people brave and patient, it would be different, 
but it often makes them callous and unpleasant. " 

"But doesn't everyone want discipline of some 
kind?" said Vincent. 

"Of the right kind, yes," said Father Payne. 
"Some people want a good deal more than they get, 
and some a certain amount less than they get. It's 
a delicate business. It is not always fortifying. 
Take a simple case. A bold, brazen sort of boy who is 
untruthful may want a whipping; but a timid and 
imaginative boy who is untruthful doesn't necessarily 
want a whipping at all — it makes him more, and not 
less, timid. One of the most ridiculous and persist- 
ent blunders in human life is to believe that a certain 
penalty is divinely appointed for a certain offence. 
Our theory of punishment is all wrong; we inflict 
punishment, as a rule, not to improve an offender, but 
out of revenge, or because it gives us a comfortable 
sense of our own justice. And the whole difficulty of 
discipline is that it is apt to be applied in lumps, and 
distributed wholesale to people who don't all want the 
same amount. We haven't really got very far away 
from the Squeers theory of giving all the boys brim- 
stone and treacle alike. " 

"Yes, but in a school," said Vincent, "would not 
the boys themselves resent it, if they were punished 
differently for the same offence?" 

"That is to say," said Father Payne, "that you 
are to treat boys, whom you are supposed to be train- 
ing, in accordance with their ideas of justice, and not in 
accordance with yours! Why should you confirm 
them in a wholly erroneous view of justice? Justice 
isn't a mathematical thing — or rather, it ought to be a 



372 Father Payne 

mathematical thing, because you ought to take into 
account a lot of factors, which you simply omit from 
your calculation. I believe very little in punishment, 
to tell you the truth ; it ought only to be inflicted after 
many warnings, when the offence is deliberately 
repeated. I don't believe that the sane and normal 
person is a habitual and deliberate offender. The 
kind of absence of self-restraint which makes people 
unable to resist temptation, in any form, is a disease, 
and ought to be segregated. I haven't the slightest 
doubt that we shall end by segregating or sterilizing 
the person of criminal tendencies, which only means 
a total inability, in the presence of a temptation, to 
foresee consequences, and which gratifies a momen- 
tary desire." 

"But apart from definite moral disease," said Vin- 
cent, "isn't it a good thing to compel people, if possible, 
into a certain sort of habit? I am speaking of faults 
which are not criminal — things like unpunctuality, 
laziness, small excesses, mild untrustworthiness, and 
so forth." 

"Well, I don't personally believe in coercive dis- 
cipline at all, " said Father Payne. ' ' I think it simply 
gets people out of shape. I believe in trying to give 
people a real motive for self -discipline : take unpunc- 
tuality, for instance. The only way to make an un- 
punctual person punctual is to convince him that it 
is rude and unjust to keep other people waiting. There 
is nothing sacred about punctuality in itself, unless 
someone else suffers by your being unpunctual. If 
it comes to that, isn't it quite as good a discipline for 
punctual people to learn to wait without impatience 
for the unpunctual? Supposing an unpunctual per- 
son were to say, ' I do it on principle, to teach precise 



Of Discipline 373 

people not to mind waiting, ' where is the flaw in that? 
Take what you call laziness. Some people work 
better by fits and starts, some do better work by 
regularity. The point is to know how you work best. 
You must not make the convenience of average people 
into a moral law. The thing to aim at is that a man 
should not go on doing a thing which he honestly 
believes to be wrong and hurtful, out of a mere habit. 
Take the small excesses of which you speak — food, 
drink, sleep, tobacco. Some people want more of 
these things than others; you can't lay down exact 
laws. A man ought to find out precisely what suits 
him best; but I'm not prepared to say that regularity 
in these matters is absolutely good for everyone. 
The thing is not to be interfered with by your habits; 
and the end of all discipline is, I believe, efficiency, 
vitality, and freedom; but it is no good substituting 
one tyranny for another. I was reading the life of a 
man the other day who simply could not believe that 
anyone could think a thing wrong and yet do it. His 
biographer said, very shrewdly, that his sense of sin 
was as dead as his ear for music — that he did not 
possess even the common liberty of right and wrong. 
That's a bad case of atrophy! You must not, of 
course, be at the mercy of your moods, but you must 
not be at the mercy of your ethical habits either. Of 
the two, I am not sure that the habit isn't the most 
dangerous." 

"You seem to be holding a brief all round, Father, " 
said Vincent. 

"No, I am not doing that," said Father Payne, 
"but my theory is this. You must know, first of all, 
what you are aiming at, and you must apply your 
discipline sensibly to that. There are certain things 



374 Father Payne 

in us which we know to be sloppy — we lie in bed, we 
dawdle, we eat too much, we moon over our work. 
All that is obviously no good, and all sensible people 
try to pull themselves up. When you have found out 
what suits you, do it boldly; but the man who admires 
discipline for its own sake is a sort of hypochondriac — 
a medicine-drinker. I have a friend who says that if 
he stays in a house, and sees a bottle of medicine in a 
cupboard, he is always tempted to take a dose. 'Is it 
that you feel ill ? ' I once said to him. ' No, ' he 
said; 'but I have an idea that it might do me good.' 
The disciplinarian is like that: he is always putting 
a little strain upon himself, cutting off this and that, 
trying new rules, heading himself off. He has an 
uneasy feeling that if he likes anything, it is a sort of 
sign that he should abstain from it: he mistrusts his 
impulses and instincts. He thinks he is getting to 
talk too much, and so he practises holding his tongue. 
The truth is that he is suspicious of life. He is like 
the schoolmaster who says, 'Go, and see what Jack 
is doing, and tell him not to ! ' Of course I am taking 
an extreme case, but there is a tendency in that direc- 
tion in many people. They think that strength means 
the power to resist, when it really means the power to 
flow. I do not think that people ought to be defer- 
ential to criticism, timid before rebuke, depressed by 
disapproval: and, on the whole, I believe that more 
harm is done by self -repression, obedience, meekness, 
than by the opposite qualities. I want men to live 
their own lives fearlessly — not offensively, of course — 
with a due regard to other people's comfort, but with- 
out any regard to other people's conventions. I 
believe in trusting yourself, on the whole, and trusting 
the world. I do not think it is wholesome or brave to 



Of Discipline 375 

live under the shadow of other people's fears or other 
people's convictions. All the people, it seems to me, 
who have done anything for the world, have been the 
people who have gone their own way; and I think 
that self-discipline, or external discipline meekly 
accepted, ends in a flattening out of men's power and 
character. Of course you fellows here are learning to 
do a definite technical thing — but you will observe 
that all the discipline here is defensive, and not coer- 
cive. I don't want you to take any shape or mould: 
I want you just to learn to do things in your own way. 
I don't ever want you to interfere with each other's 
minds too much. I don't want to interfere with your 
minds myself, except in so far as to help you to get rid 
of sloppiness and prejudices. Here, I mustn't go on 
— it's becoming like a prospectus! but it comes to this, 
that I believe in the trained mind, and not in the 
moulded mind; and I think that the moment disci- 
pline ceases to train strength, and begins to mould 
weakness, it's a thoroughly bad, thing. No one can 
be artificially protected from life without losing life — 
and life is what I am out for. " 



LXVII 

OF INCREASE 

I DID not hear the argument, but I heard Vincent 
say to Father Payne: "Of course I couldn't do 
that — it would have been so inconsistent." 

"Oh! consistency's a very cheap affair," said 
Father Payne; "it is mostly a blend of vanity and 
slow intelligence. " 

"But one must stick to something," said Vincent. 
"There's nothing so tiresome as never knowing how 
a man is going to behave. " 

"Of course," said Father Payne, "inconsistency 
isn't a virtue — it is generally the product of a quick 
and confused intelligence. But consistency ought not 
to be a principle of thought or action — you ought not 
to do or think a thing simply because you have 
thought it before — that is mere laziness! What one 
wants is a consistent sort of progress — you ought not 
to stay still. " 

"But you must have principles," said Vincent. 

"Yes, but you must expect to change them," 
said Father Payne. "Principles are only deductions 
after all: and to remain consistent as a rule only 
means that you have ceased to do anything with your 
experience, or else it means that you have taken your 
principles second-hand. They ought to be living 
things, yielding fruits of increase. I don't mean that 
376 



Of Increase 377 

you should be at the mercy of a persuasive speaker, or 
of the last book you have read — but, on the other hand, 
to meet an interesting man or to read a suggestive 
book ought to modify your views a little. You ought 
to be elastic. The only thing that is never quite the 
same is opinion; and to be holding a ten years' old 
opinion simply means that you are stranded. There's 
nothing worse than to be high and dry. " 

"But isn't it worse still," said Vincent, "to see so 
many sides to a question that you can't take a definite 
part?" 

"I don't feel sure," said Father Payne. "I know 
that the all-round sympathizer is generally found fault 
with in books; but it is an uncommon temperament, 
and means a great power of imagination. I am not 
sure that the faculty of taking a side is a very valuable 
one. People say that things get done that way; 
but a great many things get done wrong, and have to 
be undone. There is no blessing on the palpably one- 
sided people. Besides, there is a great movement in 
the world now towards approximation. Majorities 
don't want to bully minorities. Persecution has gone 
out. People are beginning to see that principles are 
few and interpretations many. I believe, as a matter 
of fact, that we ought always to be simplifying our 
principles, and getting them under a few big heads. 
Besides, you do not convert people by hammering 
away at principles. I always like the story of the 
Frenchman who said to his opponent, 'Come, let us 
go for a little walk, and see if we can disagree. ' " 

"I don't exactly see what he meant, " said Vincent. 

"Why, he meant, " said Father Payne, "that if they 
could bring their minds together, they would find that 
there wasn't very much to quarrel about. But I 



378 Father Payne 

don't believe in arguing. I don't think opinion 
changes in that way. I fancy it has tides of its own, 
and that ideas appear in numbers of minds all over the 
world, like flowers in spring." 

"But how is one ever to act at all," said Vincent, 
"if one is always to be feeling that a principle may 
turn out to be nonsense after all?" 

"Well, I think action is mainly a matter of instinct, " 
said Father Payne. "But I don't really believe in 
taking too diffuse a view of things in general. Very 
few of us are strong enough and wise enough, let me 
say, to read the papers with any profit. The news- 
papers emphasize the disunion of the world, and I be- 
lieve in its solidarity. Come, I'll tell you how I think 
people ought really to live, if you like. I think a man 
ought to live his own life, without attempting too much 
reference to what is going on in the world. I think 
it becomes pretty plain to most of us, by the time we 
reach years of discretion, what we can do and what 
we cannot. I don't mean that life ought to be lived 
in blank selfishness, without reference to anyone else. 
Most of us can't do that, anyhow — it requires extra- 
ordinary concentration of will. But I think that our 
lives ought to be intensive — that is to say, I don't 
think we ought to concern ourselves with getting rid 
of our deficiencies, so much as with concentrating and 
emphasizing our powers and faculties. We ought all 
of us to have a certain circle in mind — I believe very 
much in circles. We are very much limited, and our 
power of affecting people for good and evil is very small ; 
our chance of helping is small. The moment we try 
to extend our circle very much, to widen our influence, 
we become like a juggler who keeps a dozen plates 
spinning all at once — it is mere legerdemain. But 



Of Increase 379 

we most of us live really with about a score of people. 
We can't choose our circle altogether, and there are 
generally certain persons in it whom we should wish 
away. I think we ought to devote ourselves to our 
work, whatever it is, and outside of that to getting 
a real, intimate, and vital understanding with the 
people round us. That is a problem which is amply 
big enough for most of us. Then I think we ought to 
go seriously to work, not arguing or finding fault, not 
pushing or shoving people about, but just living on the 
finest lines we can. The only real chance of convert- 
ing other people to our principles or our ideas, is to 
live in such a way that it is obvious that our ideas 
bring us real and vital happiness. You may depend 
upon it, that is the only way to live — the positive 
way. We simply must not quarrel with our asso- 
ciates: we must be patient and sympathetic and 
imaginative." 

"But are there no exceptions?" said I. "I have 
heard you say that a man must be prepared to lose 
friends on occasions." 

"Yes," said Father Payne, "the circle shifts and 
changes a little, no doubt. I admit that it becomes 
clear occasionally that you cannot live with a particu- 
lar person. But if you have alienated him or her by 
your censoriousness and your want of sympathy, you 
have to be ashamed of yourself. If it is the other way, 
and you are being tyrannized over, deflected, hin- 
dered, then it may be necessary to break away — 
though, mind you, I think it is finer still if you do not 
break away. But you must have your liberty, and 
I don't believe in sacrificing that, because then you 
live an unreal life — and, whatever happens, you must 
not do that." 



380 Father Payne 

"But what is to be done when people are tied up 
by relationships, and can't get away?" said I. 

"Yes, there are such cases," said Father Payne; 
"I don't deny it. If there is really no escape possible, 
then you must tackle it, and make the finest thing you 
can out of the situation. Fulness of life, that is what 
we must aim at. Of course people are hemmed in in 
other ways too — by health, poverty, circumstances 
of various kinds. But, however small your saucepan 
is, it ought to be on the boil." 

"But can people make themselves active and hope- 
ful?" I said. "Isn't that just the most awful problem 
of all, the listlessness which falls on many of us, as the 
limitations draw round and the net encloses us?" 

"You must kick out for all you are worth," said 
Father Payne. "I fully admit the difficulty. But 
one of the best things in life is the fact that you can 
always do a little better than you expect. And then 
— you mustn't forget God. " 

"But a conscious touch with God?" I said. "Isn't 
that a rare thing?" 

"It need not be, " said Father Payne, very seriously. 
"If there is one thing which experience has taught me, 
it is this — that if you make a signal to God, it is 
answered. I don't say that troubles roll away, or 
that you are made instantly happy. But you will 
find that you can struggle on. People simply don't 
try that experiment. The reason why they do not is, 
I honestly believe, because of our services, where 
prayer is made so ceremoniously and elaborately that 
people get a false sense of dignity and reverence. It 
is a very natural instinct which made the disciples 
say, 'Teach us to pray,' and I do not think that 
ecclesiastical systems do teach people to pray — at 



Of Increase 381 

least the examples they give are too intellectual, too 
much concerned with good taste. A prayer need not 
be a verbal thing — the best prayers are not. It is the 
mute glance of an eye, the holding out of a hand. 
And if you ask me what can make people different, I 
say it is not will, but prayer. " 



LXVIII 

OF PRAYER 

I WAS walking about the garden on a wintry 
Sunday with Father Payne. He had a particu- 
lar mood on Sundays, I used to think, which made 
itself subtly felt — a mood serious, restrained, and 
yet contented. I do not remember how the subject 
came up, but he said something about prayer, and I 
replied: 

' ' I wish you would tell me exactly what you feel 
about piayer, Father. I never quite understand. 
You always speak as if it played a great part in your 
life, and yet I never am sure what exactly it means to 
you. " 

"You might as well say," he said, smiling, "that 
you never felt quite sure what breakfast meant to me. " 

He stopped and looked at me for a moment. "Do 
we know what anything means ? We know what 
prayer is, at any rate — one of the commonest and 
most natural of instincts. What is your difficulty? " 

"Oh, the usual one," I said, "that if the God 
to whom we pray is the Power which puts into our 
minds good desires, and knows not only what is pass- 
ing in our thoughts, but the very direction which our 
thoughts are going to take — reads us, in fact, like a 
book, as they say — what, then, is the object or pur- 
pose of setting ourselves to pray to a Power that knows 
382 



Of Prayer 383 

our precise range of thoughts, and can disentangle 
them all far better than we can ourselves?" 

"Why," said Father Payne, "that is pure fatalism. 
If you carry that on a little further it means all absence 
of effort. You might as well say, 'I will take no 
steps to provide myself with food — if God is All-Power- 
ful, and sends me a good appetite, it is His business 
to satisfy it!" 

"Oh," I said, "I see that. But if I set about 
providing myself with breakfast, I know exactly 
what I want, and have a very fair chance of obtaining 
it. But the essence of prayer is that you must not 
expect to get your desires fulfilled. " 

"I certainly do not pretend," said he, "that prayer 
is a mechanical method of getting things; it isn't a 
substitute for effort and action. Nor do I think that 
God simply withholds things unless you ask for them, 
as a dog has to beg for a piece of biscuit. I don't look 
upon prayer as the mere formulating of a list of 
requests ; and I dislike very much the way some good 
people have of getting a large number of men and 
women to pray for the same thing, as if you were 
canvassing for votes. And yet I believe that prayers 
have a way of being granted . Indeed, I think that both 
the strength and the danger of prayer lies in the fact 
that people do very much tend to get what they 
have set their hearts upon. A recurrent prayer 
for a definite thing is often a sign that a man is working 
hard to secure it. It is rather perilous to desire 
definite things too definitely, not because you are 
disappointed, but because you are often successful 
in attaining them. " 

"Then that would be a reason for not praying," 
I said. 



384 Father Payne 

Father Payne gave one of his little frowns, which 
I knew well. "I'm not arguing for the sake of arguing, 
Father," I said; "I really want to understand. It 
seems to me such a muddle." 

The little frown passed off in a smile. "Yes, 
it isn't a wholly rational thing," said Father Payne, 
"but it's a natural and instinctive thing. To forbid 
prayer seems to me like forbidding hope and love. 
Prayer seems to me just a mingling of hope and desire 
and love and confidence. It is more like talking over 
your plans and desires with God. It all depends upon 
whether you say, 'My will be done,' which is the 
wrong sort of prayer, or 'Thy will be done,' which is 
the right sort of prayer, and infinitely harder. I don't 
mind telling you this, that my prayers are an attempt 
to put myself in touch with the Spirit of God. I 
believe in God; I believe that He is trying very hard 
to bring men and women to live in a certain way — the 
right, joyful, beautiful way. He sees it clearly enough; 
but we are so tangled up with material things that 
we don't see it clearly — we don't see where our happi- 
ness lies; we mistake all kinds of things — pleasures, 
schemes, successes, comforts, desires — for happiness; 
and prayer seems to me like opening a sluice and 
letting a clear stream gush through. That's why I 
believe one must set oneself to it. The sluice is not 
always open — we are lazy, cowardly, timid; or, again, 
we are confident, self-satisfied, proud of our own 
inventiveness and resourcefulness. I don't know 
what the will is or what its limitations are; but 
I believe it has a degree of liberty, and it can ex- 
ercise that liberty in welcoming God. Of course, if 
we think of God as drearily moral, harsh, full of 
anger and disapproval, we are not likely to welcome 



Of Prayer 385 

Him; but if we feel Him full of eagerness and sym- 
pathy, of 'comfort, light, and fire of love,' as the old 
hymn says, then we desire His company. You have to 
prepare yourself for good company, you know. It is 
a bit of a strain; and I feel that the people who won't 
pray are like the lazy and sloppy people who won't 
put themselves out or forego their habits or take any 
trouble to receive a splendid guest. The difference is 
that the splendid guest is not to be got every day, 
while God is always glad of your company, I think. " 

"Then with you prayer isn't a process of asking?" 
I said. "But isn't it a way of changing yourself 
by simply trying to get your ideals clear? " 

"No, no," said Father Payne; "it's just drawing 
water from a well when you are thirsty. Of course 
you must go to the well, and let down the bucket. 
It isn't a mere training of imagination; it is help- 
ing yourself to something actually there. The more 
you pray, the less you ask for definite things. You 
become ashamed to do that. Do you remember 
the story of Hans Andersen, when he went to see the 
King of Denmark? The King made a pause at one 
point and looked at Andersen, and Andersen said 
afterwards that the King had evidently expected 
him to ask for a pension. 'But I could not,' he 
said. T know I was a fool, but my heart would not 
let me.' One can trust God to know one's desires, 
and one's heart will not let one ask for them. It 
is His will that you want to know — your own will 
that you want to surrender. Strength, clear-sighted- 
ness, simplicity — those are what flow from contact 
with God." 

"But what do you make, " I said, "of contemplative 
Orders of monks and nuns, who say that they special- 



386 Father Payne 

ize in prayer, and give up their whole time and energy 
to it?" 

"Well," said Father Payne, "it's a harmless and 
beautiful life; but it seems to me like abandoning 
yourself to one kind of rapture. Prayer seems to 
me a part of life, not the whole of it. You have 
got to use the strength given you. It is given you 
to do business with. It seems to me as if a man 
argued that because eating gave him strength, it 
must be a good thing to eat ; and that he would there- 
fore eat all day long. It isn't the gaining of strength 
that is desirable, but the using of strength. You 
mustn't sponge upon God, so to speak. And I 
don't honestly believe in any life which takes you right 
away from life. Life is the duty of all of us; and 
prayer seems to me just one of the things that help one 
to live." 

"But intercession," I said, "is there nothing in 
the idea that you can pray for those who cannot 
or will not pray for themselves?" 

"I don't know," said Father Payne. "If you 
love people and wish them well, and hate the thought 
of the evils which befall the innocent, and the over- 
flowings of ungodliness, you can't keep that out 
of your prayers, of course. But I doubt very much 
whether one can do things vicariously. It seems 
to land you in difficulties; if you say, for instance, 
'I will inflict sufferings upon myself, that others 
may be spared suffering,' logically you might go 
on to say, 'I will enjoy myself that my enjoyment 
may help those who cannot enjoy.' One doesn't 
really know how much one's own experience does 
help other people. Living with others certainly 
does affect them, but I don't feel sure that isolating 



Of Prayer 387 

oneself from others does. I think, on the whole, 
that everyone must take his place in a circle. We 
are limited by time and space and matter, you know. 
You can know and love a dozen people; you can't 
know and love a hundred thousand to much purpose. 
I remember when I was a boy that there was a run on a 
Bank where we lived. Two of the partners went there 
and did what they could. The third, a pious fellow, 
shut himself up in his bedroom and prayed. The 
Bank was saved, and he came down the next day and 
explained his absence by saying he had been giving 
them the most effectual help in his power. He thought, 
I believe, that he had saved the Bank; I don't think 
the other two men thought so, and I am inclined to side 
with them. Mind, I am not deriding the idea of a 
vocation for intercessory prayer. I don't know 
enough about the forces of the world to do that. 
It's a harmless life, a beautiful life, and a hard life, 
too, and I won't say it is useless. But I am not con- 
vinced of its usefulness. It seems to me on a par with 
the artistic life, a devotion to a beautiful dream. I 
don't, on the whole, believe in art for art's sake, and I 
don't think I believe in prayer for prayer's sake. But 
I don't propound my ideas as final. I think it possi- 
ble — I can't say more — that a life devoted to the 
absorption of beautiful impressions may affect the 
atmosphere of the world — we are bound up with each 
other behind the scenes in mysterious ways — and 
similarly I think that lives of contemplative prayer may 
affect the world. I should not attempt to discourage 
anyone from such a vocation. But it can't be taken for 
granted, and I think that a man must show cause, apart 
from mere inclination, why he should not live the 
common life of the world, and mingle with his fellows. " 



388 Father Payne 

"Then prayer, you think," I said, "is to you 
just one of the natural processes of life?" 

"That's about it!" said Father Payne. "It 
seems to me as definite a way of getting strength 
and clearness of view and hope and goodness, as 
eating and sleeping are ways of getting strength 
of another kind. To neglect it is to run the risk 
of living a hurried, muddled, self-absorbed life. I 
can't explain it, any more than I can explain eating 
or breathing. It just seems to me a condition of fine 
life, which we can practise to our help and comfort, 
and neglect to our hurt. I don't think I can say more 
about it than that, my boy!" 



LXIX 

THE SHADOW 

ONE evening, when I was sitting with Barthrop in 
the smoking-room and the others had gone 
away, he said to me suddenly, "There's something I 
want to speak to you about: I have been worrying 
about it for some little time, and it's a bad thing to do 
that. I daresay it is all nonsense, but I am bothered 
about the Father. I don't think he is well, and I don't 
think he thinks he is well. He is much thinner, you 
know, and he isn't in good spirits. I don't mean that 
he isn't cheerful in a way, but it's an effort to him. 
Now, have you noticed anything?" 

I thought for a minute, and then I said, "No, I 
don't think I have! He's thinner, of course, but he 
joked to me about that — he said he had turned 
the corner, as people do, and he wasn't going to be 
a pursy old party when he got older. Now that you 
mention it, I think he has been rather silent and 
abstracted lately. But then he often is that, you 
know, when we are all together. And in his private 
talks with me — and I have had several lately — he 
has seemed to me more tender and affectionate than 
usual even; not so amusing, perhaps, not bubbling 
over with talk, and a little more serious. If I have 
thought anything at all, it simply is that he is getting 
older. " 

389 



390 Father Payne 

"It may simply be that, of course," said Barthrop, 
looking relieved. "I suppose he is about fifty- 
eight or so? But I'll tell you something else. I 
went in to speak to him two or three days ago. Well, 
you know how he always seems to be doing something? 
He is never unoccupied indoors, though he has cer- 
tainly seen less of everyone's work of late — but that 
morning I found him sitting in his chair, looking out of 
the window, doing nothing at all; and I didn't like his 
look. How can I put it? He looked like a man who 
was going off on a long journey — and he was tired and 
worn-looking — I have never seen him looking worn be- 
fore — as if there was a strain of some kind. There 
were lines about his face I hadn't noticed before, and 
his eyes seemed larger and brighter. He said to me, 
half apologetically, 'Look here, this won't do! I'm 
getting lazy.' Then he went on, 'I was thinking, you 
know, about this place: it has been an experiment, and 
a good and happy experiment. But it hasn't founded 
itself, as I hoped.' I asked him what exactly he 
meant, and he laughed, and said: 'You know I don't 
believe in founding things ! A place like this has got to 
grow up of itself, and have a life of its own. I don't 
think the place has got that. I put a seed or two into 
the ground, but I'm not sure that they have quickened 
to life. ' Then he went on in a minute : 'You will know 
I don't say this conceitedly, but I think it has all 
depended too much on me, and I know I'm only a tiller 
of the ground. I don't believe I can give life to a 
society — I can keep it lively, but that's not the same 
thing. Something has come of my plan, to be sure, 
but it isn't going to spread like a tree — and I hoped 
it might ! But it's no good being disappointed — that's 
childish — you can't do what you mean to do in this 



The Shadow 391 

world, only what you are meant to do. I expect the 
weakness has been that I meddle too much — I don't 
leave things alone enough. I trust too much to 
myself, and not enough to God. It's been too much a 
case of "See me do it!" — as the children say.'" 

"What did you say?" I said. 

"Nothing at all," said Barthrop; "that's where 
I fail. I can't rise to an emergency. I murmured 
something about our all being very grateful to him — 
it was awfully flat ! If I could but have told him how 
I cared for him, and how splendid he had always been ! 
But those perfectly true, sincere, fine things are just 
what one can't say, unless one has it all written down 
on paper. I wish he would see a doctor, or go away for 
a bit; but I can't advise him to do that — he hates a fuss 
about anything, and most of all about health. He 
says you ought never to tell people how you are feeling, 
because they have to pretend to be interested!" 

I smiled at this, and said, "I don't think there 
really is much the matter! People can't be always 
at the top of their game, and he takes a lot out of 
himself, of course. He's always giving out!" 

"He is indeed," said Barthrop; "but I won't say 
more now. I feel better for having told you. Just 
you keep your eyes open — but, for Heaven's sake, 
don't watch him — you know how sharp he is. " 

I went off a little depressed by the talk, because 
it seemed so impossible to connect anything but 
buoyant health with Father Payne. I did not see 
him at breakfast, but he came in to lunch; and I 
saw at once that there was something amiss with 
him. He ate little, and he looked tired. However, 
as I rose to go — we did not, as I have said, talk at 
lunch — he just beckoned to me, and pointed with 



39 2 Father Payne 

his finger in the direction of his room. It was a 
well-known gesture if he wanted to speak to one. 
I went there, and stood before the fire surveying 
the room, which looked unwontedly tidy, the table 
being almost free from books and papers. But there 
lay a long folded folio sheet on the table, a legal docu- 
ment, and it gave me a chill to see the world Will 
on the top of it. Father Payne came in a moment 
later, with a smile. Then, somehow divining, as he so 
often did, exactly what had happened, he said, as if 
answering an unspoken question, "Yes, that's my will! 
I have been, in fact, making it. It's a wholesome 
occupation for an elderly man. But I only wanted 
to know if you would come for a stroll ? Yes ? That's 
all right! You are sure I'm not interfering with any 
arrangement?" 

It was a late autumn day in November: the air 
was cold and damp, the roads wet, the hedges hung 
with moisture and the leaves were almost gone from 
the trees. "Most people don't like this sort of day, " 
said Father Payne, as we went out of the gate; "but I 
like it even better than spring. Everything seems 
going contentedly to sleep, like a tired child. All the 
plants are withdrawing into themselves, into the inner 
life. They have had a pleasant time, waving their 
banners about — but they have no use for them any 
more. They are all going to be alone for a bit. Do 
you remember that epithet of Keats, about the 'cool- 
rooted' flowers? That's a bit of genius. That's what 
makes the difference between people, I think — whether 
they are cool-rooted or not. " 

He walked more slowly than was his wont to-day, 
but he seemed in equable spirits, and made many 
exclamations of delight. He said suddenly, "Do 



The Shadow 393 

you know one of the advantages of growing old? 
It is that if you have an unpleasant thing ahead 
of you, instead of shadowing the mind, as it does 
when you are young, it gives a sort of relish to the 
intervening time. I can even imagine a man in the 
condemned cell, till the end gets close, being able to 
look ahead to the day, when he wakes in the morning 
— the square meals, the pipe — I believe they allow 
them to smoke — the talk with the chaplain. It's 
always nice to feel it is your duty to talk about your- 
self, and to explain how it all came about, and why 
you couldn't do otherwise. Now I have got to go 
up to town on some tiresome business at the end 
of this week, and I'm going to enjoy the days in 
between." 

He stopped and spoke with all his accustomed 
good humour to half a dozen people whom we met. 
Then he said to me: "Do you know, my boy, I want 
to tell you that you have been one of my successes! 
I did not honestly think you would buckle to as you 
have done, and I don't think you are quite as sympa- 
thetic as I once feared!" He gave me a smile as he 
said it, and went on: "You know what I mean — I 
thought you would reflect people too much, and be 
too responsive to your companions. And you have 
been a great comfort to me, I don't deny it. But I 
thankfully discern a good hard stone in the middle of 
all the juiciness, with a tight little kernel inside it — 
I'll quote Keats again, and say 'a sweet-hearted ker- 
nel.' Mind, I don't say you will do great things. 
You are facile, and you see things very quickly and 
accurately, and you have a style. But I don't think 
you have got the tragic quality or the passionate 
gift. You are too placid and contented — but you 



394 Father Payne 

spin along, and I think you see something of the 
reality of things. You will be led forth beside the 
waters of comfort — you will lack nothing — your 
cup will be full. But the great work is done by 
people with large empty cups that take some filling — 
the people who are given the plenteousness of tears 
to drink. It's a bitter draught — you won't have to 
drink it. But I think you are on right and happy 
lines, and you must be content with good work. Any- 
how, you will always write like a gentleman, and 
that's a good deal to say. " 

This pleased and touched me very deeply. I 
began to murmur something. " Oh, no, " said Father 
Payne, "you needn't! A boy at a prize-giving 
isn't required to enter into easy talk with the presiding 
buffer! I have just handed you your prize." 

He talked after this lightly of many small things 
— about Barthrop in particular, and asked me many 
questions about him. " I am afraid I haven't allowed 
him enough initiative," said Father Payne; "that's 
a bad habit of mine. But if he had really had it, 
we should have squabbled — he's not quite fiery 
enough, the beloved Barthrop! He's awfully judi- 
cious, but he must have a lead. He's a submissioner, 
I'm afraid, as a witty prelate once said! You know 
the two sides of the choir, Decani and Cantoris as 
they are called. Decani always begin the psalms and 
say the versicles, Cantoris always respond. People 
are always one or the other, and Barthrop is a born 
Cantoris." 

We did not go very far, and he soon proposed to 
return. But just as we were nearing home, he said, 
"I think the hardest thing in life to understand — the 
very hardest of all — is our pleasure in the sense of 



The Shadow 395 



I can't think where it comes from, or why it is there, 
or what it is supposed to do for us. Do you remem- 
ber, " he said with a smile, "how Shelley, the most 
hopelessly restless of mortals, whenever he settled 
anywhere, always wrote to his friends that he had 
established himself for ever? It's the instinct which is 
most contrary to reason. Everything contradicts it — 
we are not the same people for five minutes together, 
nothing that we see or hear or taste continues — and 
yet we feel eternally and immutably fixed ; and instead 
of living each day as if it was our last — which is a 
thoroughly bad piece of advice — we live each day 
as if it was one of an endlessly revolving chain of 
days, and as if we were going to live to all eternity 
— as indeed I believe we are! Probably the reason 
for it is to give us a hint that we are immortal, after 
all, though we are tempted to think that all things 
come to an end. It is strange to think that nothing 
on which our eyes rest at this moment is the same as 
it was when we started our walk — the very stones of 
the wall are altered. It ought to make us ashamed 
of pretending that we are anything but ourselves; 
and yet we do change a little, thank God, and for the 
better. I've a fancy — though I can't say more than 
that — that we aren't meant to know anything: and I 
think that the times when we know, or think we know, 
are the times when we stand still. That seems hard ! ' ' 
— he broke off with an unusual emotion: but he was 
himself again in a moment, and said, "I don't know 
why — it's the weather, perhaps: but I feel inclined 
to do nothing but thank people all day, like the man in 
Happy Thoughts, you know, who came down late for 
breakfast and could say nothing but ' Thanks, thanks, 



396 Father Payne 

awfully thanks — thanks (to the butler), thanks (to 
the hostess) — thanks, thanks!' but it means some- 
thing — a real emotion, though grotesquely phrased! 
— I've enjoyed this bit of a walk, my boy!" 



LXX 

OF WEAKNESS 

THIS was, I think, the last talk I had with Father 
Payne before he left us, so suddenly and so 
quietly, for his last encounter. 

It was a calm and sunny day, though the air was cold 
and fresh. I finished some work I was doing, a little 
after noonday, and I walked down the garden. I was 
on the grass, and turning the corner of a tiny thicket 
of yews and hollies, where there was a secluded seat 
facing the south, I saw that Father Payne was sitting 
there in the sun alone. I came up to him, and was 
just about to speak, when I saw that his eyes were 
closed, though his lips were moving. He sat in an 
attitude of fatigue and lassitude, I thought, with one 
leg crossed over the other and his arm stretched out 
along the seat-back. I would have stolen away again 
unobserved, when he opened his eyes and saw me; 
he gave me one of his big smiles, and motioned to 
me to come and sit down beside him. I did so, 
and he put his arm through mine. I said something 
about disturbing him, and he said, "Not a bit of 
it — I shall be glad of your company, old boy. " Pre- 
sently he said, "Do you know what it is to feel sad? I 
suppose not. I don't mean troubled about anything in 
particular — there's nothing to be troubled about — but 
simply sad, in a causeless, listless way?" 
397 



398 Father Payne 

"Yes, I think so," I said. He smiled at that, and 
said, "Then you don't know what I mean, old man! 
You would be quite sure, if you had ever felt it. I 
mean a sense of feebleness and wretchedness, as if there 
was much to be done, and no desire to do it — as if your 
life had been a long mistake from beginning to end. 
Of course it is quite morbid and unreal, I know that! 
It is a temptation of the devil, sure enough, and it is 
an uncommonly effective one. He gets inside the 
weakness of our mortal nature, and tells us that we 
have come down to the truth at last. It's all non- 
sense, of course, but it's infernally ingenious non- 
sense. He brings all the failures of the world before 
your mind and heart, the thought of all the people 
who have fallen by the roadside and can't get up, and, 
worse still, all the people who have lost hope and 
pride, and don't want to be different. He points out 
how brief our time is, and how little we know what 
lies beyond. He shows us how the strong and un- 
scrupulous and cruel people succeed and have a 
good time, and how many well-meaning, sensitive, 
muddled people come to hopeless grief. Oh, he 
has a score of instances, a quiver full of poison- 
ous shafts." He was silent for a minute, and 
then he said, "Old boy, we won't heed him, you 
and I. We'll say, 'Yes, my dear Apollyon, all 
that is undoubtedly true. You do a lot of mischief, 
but your time is short. You wound us and disable 
us — you can even kill us; but it's a poor policy at 
best. You defeat yourself, because we slip away 
and you can't follow us. And when we are re- 
freshed and renewed, we will come back, and go on 
with the battle.' That's what we'll say, like old Sir 
Andrew Barton: 



Of Weakness 399 

'"I'll but lie down and bleed awhile, 
And then I'll rise and fight again.' 

You must never mind being defeated, old man. 
You must never say that your sins have done for 
you! I don't care what a man has done, I don't 
care how cruel, wicked, sensual, evil he has been, 
if in the bottom of his heart he can say, 'I belong 
to God, after all !' That's the last and worst assault of 
the devil, when he comes and whispers to you that you 
have cut yourself off from God. You can't do that, 
whatever you feel. I have been thinking to-day of all 
the mistakes I have made, how I have drifted along, 
how I have enjoyed myself, when I might have been 
helping other people; what a lazy, greedy, ugly busi- 
ness it has all been, how little I have ever made myself 
do anything. But I don't care. I go straight to God 
and I say, 'Father, I have sinned against Heaven and 
before Thee, and am no more worthy to be called 
Thy son.' But I am His son, for all that, and I know 
it and He knows it ; and Apollyon may straddle across 
the way as much as he likes, but he can't stop me. If 
he does stop me, he only sends me straight home." 

I saw the tears stand in Father Payne's eyes, arid 
I said hurriedly and eagerly, "Why, Father, you 
have done so much, for me, for all of us, for every- 
one you have ever had to do with. Don't speak 
so; it isn't true, it hasn't been a failure. You are 
the only person I have met who has showed me 
what goodness really is." 

Father Payne pressed my arm, but he did not 
speak for a moment. 

"You are very good to me, old man," he said in 
a moment. "I was not trying to get a testimonial 



400 Father Payne 

out of you, you know; and of course you can't judge 
how far I have fallen short of all I might have done. 
But your affection and your kindness are very pre- 
cious to me. You give me a message from God! It 
matters little how near the truth you are or how far 
away. God doesn't think of that. He isn't a hard 
reckoner; He's only glad when we return to Him, and 
put down our tired head upon His shoulder for a little. 
But even so, that isn't the end. As soon as we are 
strong again, we must begin again. There's plenty 
left to do. The battle isn't over because you or I are 
tired. He is tired Himself, I dare say. But it all goes 
on, and there is victory ahead. Don't forget that, 
dear boy. It's no good being heart-broken or worn 
out. Rise and fight again as soon as you can. I'm 
quite ready — I haven't had enough. I have had 
an easy post, I don't deny that. I have suffered 
very little, as suffering goes; and I'm grateful for that; 
but we mustn't fall in love with rest. If we sleep, it is 
only that we may rise refreshed, and go off again sing- 
ing. We mustn't be afraid of weakness and suffering, 
and we mustn't be afraid of joy and strength either. 
That's treachery, you know." 

Presently he said, "Now you must leave me here a 
little ! You came in the nick of time, and you brought 
me a message. It always comes, if you ask for it! 
And I shall say a prayer for the Little Master himself, 
as Sintram called him, before I go. He has his points, 
you know. He is uncommonly shrewd and tenacious 
and brave, He's fighting for his life, and I pity him 
whenever he suspects — and it must be pretty often — 
that things are not going his way. I don't despair of 
the old fellow himself, if I may say so. I suspect 
him of a sense of humour. I can't help thinking he 



Of Weakness 401 

will capitulate and cut his losses some day, and then 
we shall get things right in a trice. He will be con- 
quered, and perhaps convinced; but he won't be used 
vindictively, whatever happens. My knowledge of 
that, and of the fact that he has got defeat ahead of 
him, and knows it, is the best defence against him, even 
when it is his hour, and the power of darkness, as it 
has been to-day." 

I got up and left him ; he smiled at me and waved his 
hand. 



LXXI 

THE BANK OF THE RIVER 

THE week passed without anything further 
occurring to arouse our anxieties, and Father 
Payne went up to town on the Monday : he went off 
in apparently good spirits: but we got a wire in the 
course of the day to say that he was detained in town 
by business and would write. On the following morn- 
ing, Barthrop came into my room in silence, shortly 
after breakfast, and handed me a letter without a 
word. It was very short: it ran as follows: 

"Dear Leonard, — I want you to come up to town 
to-morrow to see me, and if Duncan cares to come, I shall 
be delighted to see him too, though I know he has an 
artistic objection to seeing people who are ill, and I 
understand that I am ill. I saw a doctor yesterday, and 
he advised me to see a specialist, who advised me to have 
an operation. It seems better to get it over at once; so I 
went without delay into a nursing home, where I feel like 
a child in the nursery again. I want to talk over 
matters, and it will be better to say nothing which will 
cause a fuss. So just run up to-morrow, there's a good 
man, and you can get back in the evening. Ever yours, 

"C.P." 

It happened that there were only two others at 
Aveley at the time, Kaye and a younger man, Raven, 
402 



The Bank of the River 403 

who had just joined. We determined to say nothing 
about it till the following morning: the day passed 
heavily enough. I found I could do nothing with the 
dread of what it might all mean overhanging me. I 
admired Barthrop's common-sense: he spent the day, 
he told me, in doing accounts — he acted as a sort of 
bursar — and he kept up a quiet conversation at dinner 
in which I confess I played a very poor part. Kaye 
never noticed anything, and had no curiosity, and 
Raven had no suspicion of anything unusual. I slept 
ill that night, and found myself in a very much de- 
pressed mood on the following morning. I realized 
at every moment how entirely everything at Aveley 
was centred upon Father Payne, and how he was both 
in the foreground as well as in the background of all 
that we did or thought. Our journey passed almost 
in silence, and we drove straight to the nursing home 
in Mayfair. We were admitted to a little waiting- 
room in a bright, fresh-looking house, and were 
presently greeted by a genial and motherly old lady, 
dressed in a sort of nursing uniform, who told us 
that Mr. Payne was expecting us. We asked anx- 
iously how he was. "Oh, he is very cheerful," she 
said; "his nurse, Sister Jane, thinks he is the 
most amusing man she ever saw. You must not 
worry about him. The operation is to be on Friday 
— he seems very well and strong in himself, and we 
will soon have him all right again — you will see! 
He is just the sort of man to make a good recovery. " 
Then she added, "Mr. Payne said he thought you 
would like to see the doctor, so he is going to look in 
here in half an hour from now — he will see Mr. Payne 
first, and then you can have a good talk to him. You 
are going back this afternoon, I think?" 



404 Father Payne 

"That depends!" said Barthrop. 

"Oh, Mr. Payne is expecting you to go back, I 
know — we will just run up and see him now. " 

We went up two nights of stairs; the matron 
knocked at a door in the passage, and we went in. 
Father Payne was sitting up in bed, in a sort of blue 
wrapper which gave him, I thought, a curiously 
monastic air — he was reading quietly. The room 
was large and airy, and looked out on the backs 
of tall houses: it was quiet enough: there was just a 
far-off murmur of the town in the air. 

He greeted us with much animation, and smiled 
at me. "It's good of you to come, I'm sure," he 
said, "with your feeling about ill people. I don't 
object to that, " he added in the familiar manner. " I 
think it's a sign of health, you know!" We sat down 
beside him. "Now," said Father Payne, "don't 
let's have any grave looks or hushed voices — you 
remember what Baines told us, when he joined the 
Church of Rome, that when he got back after his 
reception, his friends all spoke to him as if he had had a 
serious illness. The matter is simple enough — and 
I'm going to speak plainly. I have got some internal 
mischief, something that obstructs the passages, and 
it has got to be removed. There's a risk, of course — 
they never can tell exactly what they will find, but 
they don't think it has gone too far to be remedied. 
I don't pretend to like it — in fact it's decidedly incon- 
venient. I like my own little plans as well as anyone! 
and this time I don't seem able to look ahead — there's 
a sort of wall ahead of me. I feel as if I had come, 
like the boy in the Water Babies, to the place which 
was called Stop!" He paused a moment and smiled 
on us, his big good-natured smile. 



The Bank of the River 405 

"But if I put my head out of the other end of the 
tunnel, I shall go on as usual. If I don't, then I had 
better tell you what I have done. You know I have 
no near relations. The noble family of Payne is 
practically summed up in me. The Vicar's a sort of 
cousin, but a very diluted one. I have arranged by my 
will that if you two fellows think you can keep the 
place going on its present lines, you can have a try. 
But I don't think it will do. I think it will be artificial 
and possibly ridiculous. I don't think it has got life! 
And if you decide not to try, then it will all go to my 
old College, which is quite alive. I would rather they 
would not sell it — but bless me, what does it matter? 
It is a mistake to try and grip anything with a dead 
hand. But if I get through, and I believe I have a 
good chance of doing so, you must just keep things 
going till I get back — which won't be long. There's 
the case in a nutshell! You quite understand? I 
don't want you to do what you think I should wish, 
because I don't wish. And now we won't say another 
word about it, unless there are any questions you 
would like to ask. By the way, I have arranged the 
program for the day. The doctor is coming to see 
me presently, and while he is here you can have some 
lunch — they will see to that — and then you can have a 
talk to him, while I have my lunch — I can tell you 
they do feed me up here ! — and then we will have a talk 
and you can catch the 4.30. You know how I like 
planning out a day. " 

"But we thought we would like to stay in town, 
and see it all through," said Barthrop. "We have 
brought up some things." 

"Stuff and nonsense!" said Father Payne in his old 
manner. "Back you go by the 4.30, things and all! 



406 Father Payne 

I have got the best nurse in the world, Sister Jane. 
By George, it's a treat exploring that woman's mind. 
She's full of kindness and common-sense and courage, 
without a grain of reason. There's nothing in the 
world that woman wouldn't do, and nothing she 
wouldn't believe — she's entirely mediaeval. Then I 
have some books: and I'm going to read and talk and 
play patience — I'm quite good at that already — and 
eat and drink and sleep. I'm not to be disturbed, I 
tell you ! To-morrow is a complete holiday : and on 
Friday the great event comes off. I won't have any 
useless emotion, or any bedside thoughts ! " He glanced 
at us smiling and said, "Oh, of course, my dear boys, 
I'm only joking. I know you would like to stay, 
and I would like to have you here well, enough: but 
see here — if all goes well, what's the use of this drama? 
— people can't behave quite naturally, however much 
they would like to, and I don't want any melting looks : 
and if it goes the other way — well, I don't like good- 
byes. I agree with dear old Mrs. Barbauld: 

"'Say not Good-night, but in some brighter clime 
Bid me Good-morning.'" 

He was silent for a moment — and just at that mo- 
ment the doctor arrived. 

We went off to lunch with the old matron, who 
talked cheerfully about things in general: and it 
was strange to feel that what was to us so deep a 
tragedy was to her just a familiar experience, a thing 
that happened day by day. 

Then the doctor came in, a tall, thin, pale, unem- 
barrassed man, very frank and simple. 

"Yes," he said, "there's a risk — I don't deny 
that! One never knows exactly what the mischief 



The Bank of the River 407 

is or how far it extends. I told Mr. Payne exactly 
what I thought. He is the sort of man to whom 
one can do that. But he is strong, he has lived a 
healthy life, he has a great vitality — everything is 
in his favour. How long has he seemed to be ill, by 
the way?" 

"Some three or four months, I think," said Barth- 
rop. "But it is difficult when you see anyone every 
day to realize a change — and then he is always cheer- 
ful." 

"He is," said the doctor. "I never saw a better 
patient. He told me his symptoms like a doctor 
describing someone else's case. I never heard any- 
thing so impersonal! We managed to catch Dr. 
Angus — that's the specialist, you know, who will 
operate. Mr. Payne wasn't in the least flurried. 
He showed no sign of being surprised: we sent him 
in here at once, and he seems to have made friends 
with everyone. That's all to the good, of course. 
He's not a nervous subject. No, " he added reflec- 
tively, "he has an excellent chance of recovery. 
But I should deceive you if I pretended there was 
no risk. There is a risk, and we must hope for the 
best. By the way, gentlemen," he added, taking 
up his hat, "I hope you won't think of staying in 
town. Mr. Payne seems most anxious that you 
should go back, and I think his wish should be para- 
mount. You can do nothing here, and I think 
your remaining would fret him. I won't attempt 
to dictate, but I feel that you would do well to go!" 

"Oh, yes, we will go," said Barthrop. "You 
will let us know how all goes?" 

"Of course!" said the doctor. "You shall hear 
at once!" 



408 Father Payne 

We went back, and spent an hour with Father 
Payne. I shall never forget that hour: he talked 
on quietly, seeing that we were unable to do our 
part. He spoke about the men and their work, 
and gave pleasant, half-humorous summaries of their 
characters. He gave us some little reminiscences of 
his life in London; he talked about the villagers at 
Aveley, and the servants. I realized afterwards that 
he had spoken a few words about every single person 
in the circle, small or great. The time sped past, and 
presently they told us that our cab was at the door. 
"Now don't make me think you are going to miss the 
train, old boys ! " said Father Payne, raising himself up 
to shake hands. "I have enjoyed the sight of you. 
Give them all my love : be good and wise ! God bless 
you both!" He shook hands with Barthrop and with 
me, and I felt the soft touch of his firm hand, as I had 
done at our first meeting. Barthrop did not speak, and 
went hurriedly from the room, without looking round. 
I could not help it, but I bent down and kissed his 
hand. "Well, well!" he said indulgently and gave 
me a most tender and beautiful look out of his big 
eyes, and then he motioned to me to go. I went in 
silence. 

We felt, both of us, a premonition of the worst 
disaster. I knew in my heart that it was the end. 
It seemed to me characteristic of Father Payne to 
make his farewells simply, and without any dramatic 
emphasis. The way in which he had spoken of all 
his friends, in that last hour we spent with him, had 
been a series of adieux, and even as I recalled his 
words, they seemed to me to shape themselves into 
unspoken messages. His own calmness had been 
unmistakable, and was marvellous to me; but it 



The Bank of the River 409 

•was all the more impressive because he did not, 
as one has read in some of the well-known scenes 
recorded in history of the deaths of famous men, 
seem to be attempting to say anything memorable 
or magnanimous. "What can I say that will be 
worthy of myself?" — that question appears to me 
to be sometimes lurking in the minds of men who have 
played a great part in the world, and who are deter- 
mined to play it to the end. It is, of course, a noble 
sort of courage which enables a man. at the very thresh- 
old of death, to force himself to behave with dignity 
and grandeur : but it seemed to me now to be an even 
more supreme courage to be, as Father Payne was, 
simply himself. Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Thomas 
More, Charles II, Archbishop Laud, all died with a real 
greatness of undismayed bravery, but with just 
a sense of enacting a part rehearsed. The death scene 
of Socrates, which is, I suppose, a romantically con- 
structed tale, does indeed give a picture of perfect 
naturalness: and I thought that Father Payne's 
demeanour, like that of Socrates, showed clearly 
enough that the idea of death was not an overshadow- 
ing dread dispelled by an effort of the will, but that it 
was not present as a fear in his mind at all, and rather 
regarded with a reverent curiosity : and I was reminded 
of a saying of Father Payne's which I have elsewhere 
recorded, that the virtues to which we give our most 
unhesitating admiration are the instinctive virtues 
rather than the reasoned virtues. If Father Payne 
had appeared to be keeping a firm hold on himself, and 
to be obliging himself to speak things timely and 
fitting, I should have admired him deeply: but I 
admired him all the more because of his unaffected 
tranquillity and unuttered affection. He had just 



4io Father Payne 

enveloped us in his own calmness, and gone straight 
forward. 

We made our journey almost in silence: Barthrop 
was too much moved to speak: and my own mind 
was dim with trouble, at all that we were to lose, and 
yet drawn away into an infinite loyalty and tender- 
ness for one who had been more than a father to me. 



LXXII 

THE CROSSING 

THE end is soon told. On the following day, we 
thought it best to tell our two companions and 
the Vicar what was happening, and we also told the 
old butler that Father Payne was ill. It was a 
day of infinite dreariness to me, with outbursts of 
sharp emotion at the sight of everything so closely 
connected with Father Payne, and with the thought 
that he would see them no more. 

I was vsitting in my room on the Friday morning, 
after a sleepless night, when Barthrop came in and 
handed me a telegram from the doctor. "Mr. 
Payne never recovered consciousness, and died an 
hour after the operation. All details arranged. 
Please await letter." I raised my eyes to Barthrop's 
face, but saw that he could not speak. I could 
say nothing either: my mind and heart seemed to 
crumble suddenly into a hopeless despair. 

A letter reached us the same evening by train. 
It was to the effect that Father Payne had written 
down some exact directions the day before and given 
them to the matron. He did not wish, in case of his 
death, that anyone should see his body: he wished 
to be placed in the simplest of coffins, as soon as 
possible, and that the coffin should be sent down by 
train to Aveley, be taken from the station straight to 
411 



412 Father Payne 

the church, and if possible to be buried at once. But 
even so, that was only his wish, and he particularly- 
desired to avoid alike all ceremony and inconvenience. 
But besides that there were two notes enclosed ad- 
dressed in Father Payne's hand to Barthrop and 
myself, which ran as follows: 

" My dear Leonard, — I thought it very good of you to 
come up to see me, and no less good of you to go away as 
I desired. It is possible, of course, that I may return to 
you, and all be as before. But to be frank, I do not think 
it will be so. Even if I survive, I shall, I think, be much 
weakened by this operation, and shall have the possibility 
of a recurrence of the disease hanging over me. Much 
as I love life, and the world where I have found it pleasant 
to live, I do not want to lead a broken sort of existence, 
with invalid precautions and limitations. I think that 
this would bring out all that is worst in me, • and would 
lead to unhappiness both in myself and in all those 
about me. If it has to be so, I shall do my best, but 
I think it would be a discreditable performance. I 
do not, however, think that I shall have this trial laid 
upon me. I feel that I am summoned elsewhere, and 
I' am glad to think that my passage will be a swift 
one. I am not afraid of what lies beyond, because 
I believe death to be simple and natural enough, and 
a perfectly definite thing. Of what lies beyond it, 
I can form no idea; all our theories are probably quite 
wide of the mark. But it will be the same for me as it has 
been for all others who have died, and as it will some day 
be for you; and when we know, we shall be surprised that 
we did not see what it would be. I confess that I love the 
things that I know, and dislike the unknown. The 
world is very dear and familiar, and it has been kind and 



The Crossing 413 

beautiful to me, as well as full of interest. But I expect 
that things will be much simplified. A nd please bear this 
in mind, that such a scene which we went through yester- 
day is worse for those who stand by and can do nothing 
than for the man himself; and you will believe me when I 
say that I am neither afraid nor unhappy. 

" With regard to my wishes about the place being kept 
on, on its present lines, remember that it is only a wish, 
and not to be regarded as a binding obligation or under- 
taken against your judgment. I trust you fully in 
this, as I have always trusted you; and I will just thank 
you, once and for all, for all that you have done and 
been. I shall always think of you with deep gratitude 
and lasting affection. God bless you now and always. 
Your old friend, 

"Charles Payne." 

To me he had written : 

"My dear Boy, — Please read my letter to Barthrop, 
which is meant for you as well. I won't repeat myself — 
you know I dislike that. But I would like just to say 
that you have been more like a son to me than anyone I 
ever have known, and I thank God for bringing you into 
my life, and for all your kind and faithful affection. 
You must just go on as you have begun; and I can only 
say that if I still have any knowledge of what goes on in 
the world, my affection and interest will not fail; and if I 
have not, I shall believe that we shall still find each other 
again, and rejoice in mutual knowledge and confidence. 
You are very dear to me, and always will be. 

"Settle everything with Leonard. I know that you 
will be able to interpret my wishes as I should wish them to 
be interpreted. Your affectionate old friend, 

"C. Payne." 



4H Father Payne 

The last act was simple enough. The prepara- 
tions were soon made. The coffin arrived at mid- 
day, and was buried in the afternoon, between the 
church and the Hall. It was sad and beautiful to 
see the heartfelt grief of the villagers: and it was 
wonderful to me that at that moment I recovered 
a kind of serenity on the surface of the grief below, 
so that in the still afternoon as we walked away 
from the grave it seemed to me strange rather than 
sorrowful. With those last letters in mind, it seemed 
to me almost traitorous to mourn. He at least had 
his heart's desire, and I did not doubt that he was 
abundantly satisfied. 



LXXIII 

AFTER-THOUGHTS 

BARTHROP and I decided that we could not hope 
to continue the scheme. We had neither the 
force nor the experience. The whole society was, we 
felt, just the expression of Father Payne's person- 
ality, and without it, it had neither stability nor 
significance. Barthrop and the Vicar were left 
money legacies: the servants all received little pen- 
sions: there was a sum for distribution in the village, 
and a fund endowed to meet certain practical needs of 
the place. We handed over the estate to Father 
Payne's old College, the furniture and pictures to go 
with the house, which was to be let, if possible, to a 
tenant who would be inclined to settle there and make 
it his home: the income of the estate was to pro- 
vide travelling scholarships. All had been carefully 
thought out with much practical sense and insight. 

Our other two companions went away. Barthrop 
and I stayed on at the Hall together for some weeks 
to settle the final arrangements. We had some 
wonderfully touching letters from old pupils and 
friends of Father Payne's. One in particular, saying 
that the writer owed an infinite debt of gratitude to 
Father Payne, for having saved him from himself 
and given him a new life. 

We talked much of Father Payne in those days: 
4i5 



4i 6 Father Payne 

and I went alone to all the places where I had walked 
with him, recalling more gratefully than sadly how he 
had looked and moved and talked and smiled. 

It came to the last night that we were to spend 
at the Hall together. Everything had been gone 
through and arranged, and we were glad, I think, to be 
departing. 

"I don't know what to say and think about it 
all," said Barthrop; "I feel at present quite lost and 
stranded, as if my motive for living were gone, and 
as if I could hardly take up my work again. I know 
it is wrong, and I am ashamed of it. Father Payne 
always said that we must not depend helplessly upon 
persons or institutions, but must find our own real life 
and live it — you remember ? ' ' 

"Yes," I said, "indeed I do remember! But I do 
not think he ever realized quite how strong he was, 
and how he affected those about him. He did not 
need us — I sometimes think he did not need anyone — 
and he credited everyone with living the same intent 
life that he lived. But I shall always be infinitely 
grateful to him for showing me just that — that one 
must live one's own life, through and in spite of every- 
thing grievous that happens. The temptation is to 
indulge grief, and to feel that collapse in such a case 
is a sign of loyalty. It isn't so — if one collapses, it 
only means that one has been living an artificial and 
parasitical life. Father Payne would have hated 
that — and I don't mean to do it. He has given me 
not only an example, but an inspiration — a real cur- 
rent of life has flowed into my life from his — or perhaps 
rather through his from some deeper origin. " 

"That is so," said Barthrop, "that is perfectly 
true! and don't you remember too how he always said 



After-Thoughts 417 

life must be a real fight — a joining in the fight that was 
going forwards? It need not be wrangling or disput- 
ing, or finding fault with other people, or maintaining 
and confuting. He used to say that people fought in a 
hundred ways — with their humour, their companion- 
ableness, their kindness, their friendliness — it need not 
be violent, and indeed if it was violent, that was 
fighting on the wrong side — it had only to be calm 
and sincere and dutiful. " N 

"Did he say that?" I said. "Yes, I am sure he 
did — no one else could say it or think of it. Of course, 
we have to fight, but not by dealing injury and harm, 
but by seeking and following peace and goodwill. 
Well, we must try — and it may be that we shall find 
him again, though he is hidden for a little while with 
God." 

"Yes," said Barthrop, "we shall find him, or 
he will find us — it makes little difference: and he 
will always be the same, though I hope we may 
be different!" 



LXXIV 

DEPARTURE 

IT was a soft and delicious spring morning when I 
left Aveley — and I have never had the heart to 
visit it again. I had had a sleepless night, with 
the thought of Father Payne continually in my mind. 
I saw him in a score of attitudes, as he loitered in the 
garden with that look of inexpressible and tender 
interest that he had for all that grew out of the earth — 
worshipping, I used to think, at the shrine of life — or 
as he sat rapt in thought in church, or as hest rode 
beside me along the uplands, or as he came and went 
in a hurried abstraction, or as he argued and discussed, 
with his great animated smile and his quick little ges- 
tures. I felt how his personality had filled our lives 
to the brim, as a spring whose waters fail not. It was 
not that he was a perfect character, with a tranquil 
and effortless superiority, or with a high intellectual 
tenacity, or with an unruffled serenity. He was 
sensitive, impatient, fitful, prejudiced. He had little 
constructive capacity, no creative or dramatic power, 
no loftiness of tragic emotion. I knew all that; I did 
not regard him with a false or uncritical reverence. 
But he was vital, generous, rich in zest and joy, heroic, 
as no other man I had ever known. He had no petty 
ambition, no thirst for recognition, no acidity of judg- 
ment. He never sought to impress himself: but his 
418 



Departure 419 

was a large, affectionate, liberal nature, more respon- 
sive to life, more lavish of self, more disinterested than 
any human being that had crossed my path. He had 
never desired to make disciples — he was not self- 
confident or self-regarding enough for that. But he 
had continued to draw us all with him into a vortex 
of life, where the stream ran swiftly, and where it 
seemed disgraceful to be either listless or unconcerned. 
I blessed the kindly fate that had guided me to him, 
and had won for me his deep regard. I did not wish 
to copy or imitate him — he had infected me with a 
deep distrust for dependence — I only wished to live my 
own life in the same eager spirit. As he had said to me 
once, the motto for every man was to be Amor Fati — 
not a reluctant acquiescence, or a feeble optimism, 
or a gentle resignation, but a passion for one's own 
destiny, a deep desire to make the most and the best 
out of life, and a strong purpose to share one's 
best with all who were journeying at one's side. 

So the night passed, thick with recollections and 
regrets, deepening into a horror of loss and darkness, 
and then slowly brightening into the calm prelude 
of a day of farewell. The birds began to chirp and 
twitter in the ivy ; the thrush uttered her long-drawn 
notes, sweetly repeated and sustained in the dusky 
bushes. That sound was much connected in my mind 
with Aveley. To be awakened thus in the summer 
dawn, to listen awhile to the delicious sound, to fall 
asleep again with the thought of the long pleasant day 
of work and friendship ahead of me, had been one of 
my greatest luxuries. 

I rose early, and made my last preparations, and 
then, having a little time before the last meal I was 
to take with Barthrop, I went round about the garden 



420 Father Payne 

with a desire to draw into my spirit for the last time 
the pure and happy atmosphere of the place. 

I saw the beds fringed with purple polyanthus, and 
the daffodils in the dewy grass. I gazed at the long 
lines of the low hills across the stream, with the wood- 
land spaces all flushed with spring. I heard the cawing 
of the rooks in the soft air, and the bubbling song of the 
chaffinches filled the shrubberies. 

I knew the mood of old — the mood in which, after 
a holiday sojourn in some place which one has learned 
to love, a happy space of time stained by no base 
anxiety, shadowed by no calamity, the call to rejoin 
the routine of life makes itself heard half reluctantly, 
half ardently. The heart at such moments tries to be 
grateful without regret, and hopeful without indiffer- 
ence. The purpose to go, the desire to stay, wrestle 
together; and now at the end of the happiest and most 
fruitful period I had ever known orwas ever, I thought, 
likely to know, I felt like Jacob wrestling with the 
angel till the breaking of the day, and crying out, half 
in weakness, half in strength, "I will not let thee go 
until thou bless me. " 

It came, the sudden blessing which I desired. It 
fell like some full warm shower upon the thirsty earth. 
In that moment I had the blissful instinct which had 
before been but a reasoned conviction, that Father 
Payne was near me, with me, about me, enfolding me 
with a swift tenderness, and yet at the same time point- 
ing me forward, bidding me clearly and almost, it 
seemed, petulantly, to disengage myself from all 
dependence upon himself or his example. He had 
other things to do, I felt with something like a smile, 
than to hover over me and haunt my path with tender- 
ness. Such weakness of sentiment was worthy neither 



Departure 4 21 

of himself nor of myself. I had all the world before 
me, and I was to take my part in it with spirit and even 
gaiety. To shrink into the shadow, to live in tearful 
retrospect — it was not to be thought of; and I had 
in that moment a glow of thankful energy which made 
light of grief and pain alike. I must take hold of life 
instantly and with both hands. I saw it in a sudden 
flash of light. 

I went to the churchyard, I stood for an instant 
beside the grave, now turfed over and planted with 
daffodils. I put aside from my heart, once and 
for all, the old wistful instinct which ties the living 
to the dead. The poor body that lay there, dust 
in dust, had no more to do with Father Payne than the 
stained candle-socket with the flame that had leapt 
away upon the air. That was a moment of true and 
certain joy; so that when I went back to the house 
and joined Barthrop, I felt no longer the uneasy 
quivering of the spirit which had long overmastered 
me. He too was calm and brave; we sat together for 
the last time, we talked with an unaffected cheerful- 
ness of the future. He too, I saw, had experienced 
the same loosening of the spirit from its trivial bonds, 
dear and beautiful as they were, so long as one did not 
hug them close. 

"I never thought," he said to me at last, "to 
go light-heartedly away — and yet I can do even 
that! I have heard something, I can hardly say 
what, which tells me to go forward, not to hanker, 
not to look back — and which tells me best of all that 
it would be almost like treachery to wish the Father 
back again. It is better so! I say this, " he went on, 
"not with resignation, not with a mild desire to make 
the best of a bad business, but with a serene certainty 



422 Father Payne 

that it is not a bad business at all. I cannot tell where 
it is gone, the cloud that has oppressed me — but it is 
gone, and it will not come back. " 

"Yes," I said, "I recognize that — I feel it too; 
our work here is done, and we have work waiting 
for us. We shall meet, we shall compare experiences, 
we shall love our fate. Life is to be a new quest, not 
an old worship. That is to be our loyalty to Father 
Payne, that we are to believe in life, and not only to 
believe in memory." 

It was soon over. Barthrop was to go later, and he 
came out to see me go. Just before I started, the old 
clock played its sweet tune ; we stood in silence listen- 
ing. "That is the best of omens," I said, "to depart 
with thanksgiving and the voice of melody." He 
smiled in my face, we clasped hands; I drove up the 
little road, while he stood at the door, smiling and 
waving his hand, till I turned into the main road, be- 
tween the blossoming hedges, and saw Aveley no 



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